About a Boy

Hornby’s second novel, About a Boy (1998), concerns another feckless 30-something and his unlikely friendship with a 12-year-old misfit. It was made into a movie in 2002 and a TV series in 2014. His other novels include How to Be Good (2001), A Long Way Down (2005; film…

…which was based on a novel by Nick Hornby, he portrayed a nerdy child with “Vulcan” eyebrows who is taken under the wing of an unlikely mentor (played by Hugh Grant).