Juliet, Naked is so close and yet so far. Nick Hornby's sleepy see-side tale of a rather boring romance between a faded rock star and a fading middle-aged woman is a huge letdown from the charms of his previous work.

It starts out rather promisingly making fun of the sorry life of those that chase erstwhile bands years (20 years in this case) after their demise. It punches the cybergroupies in the face and laughs as they bleed. This is perhaps the only redeeming side story in this novel. Unfortunately, rather than continue down this road Hornby decides to take you to the rather painfully boring life of the said faded rock star and tries to create some sort of an interest by dragging his even more uninteresting family into the story.

Hornby fails when he tries to analyze a failed rock star's pathetic life. No, we don't want Hornby to analyze. We want him simply to present, to demonstrate, to show, not tell. That's why we liked High Fidelity and that's why we fell in love with About a Boy.

And as if all of this was not enough we have to endure the tiresome love story of this tired couple. Very insipid, uninspired drivel.

Juliet may be naked but she still has a long way to go before she can be seducing.