"A brilliant book by one of the best writers around--not just a book about football, but a book about love, death and the feather-cut." --Julie Burchill

"A lovely book, by turns vivid, wise, sad, jubilant, enraged and very, very funny. I read it in one sitting." --Pete Davies I have measured out my life in Arsenal Fixtures, and any event of any significance has a footballing shadow. When did my first real love affair end? The day after a disappointing 2-2 draw at home to Coventry. For a man to chronicle his life in match reports may be a mark of his ingenuity. It is certainly a measure of his obsession.
Nick Hornby's affliction first took hold in 1968 when, as a sombre eleven-year-old, he saw Arsenal beat Stoke City (1-0 from a penalty rebound). From that first momentous afternoon, and for the next twenty-four years, the swings and shifts of his own life became inextricably linked with the changing fortunes of his team. The blind faith of childhood, adolescent alienation, adult neuroses--all were played out on the terraces at Highbury. A brilliant blend of personal insight and reportage, Fever Pitch is not just about goals and rain and semi-final replays. It's also about suburbia, death, sex and ambition. It is the most memorable picture ever produced of what is to be a fan. Fellow sufferers, and those who have to live with them, will recognise the symptoms, no matter what the team, or what the obsession.

Synopsis
This book, chronicled from the perspective of a fanatical ten-year-old soccer fan, through disillusioned adolescence, to an adult "who should know better", examines the absurdities, idiosyncrasies and traumas of everyday life and football. While Chelsea were undoubtedly the football team at the heart of fashionable London in the late 1960s, it proved to be the quiet backstreets around Highbury and Finsbury Park which led a sombre schoolboy from Maidenhead into a 20-year obsession with football, and Arsenal FC in particular. Nick Hornby became hooked after seeing Arsenal beat Stoke City (1-0 from a penalty rebound) in 1968. 24 years later this book is an attempt to understand football as an obsession. Interweaving his personal and familial upheavals with the varied fortunes of Arsenal over two decades, Nick Hornby has produced a genuine insight into what it is like to be a fan. Combining anecdote with a wider commentary on the state of the game, the book touches upon many issues; from pre-match entertainment to the availability of FA Cup tickets, hooliganism, the tragedies at Heysel and Hillsborough, non-league and school football, and Arsenal's reputation as the most boring team in the Football League.

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