SPEAKING WITH THE ANGEL

This short-story collection edited by the author of High Fidelity boasts a litany of hip writers: Zadie Smith (White Teeth), Irvine Welsh (Trainspotting), and Dave Eggers among them. Like Bono's campaign to reduce Third World debt -- Hornby's comparison -- this book supports a worthy cause: the school Hornby's autistic son attends. But there's no need to buy this book for charity's sake: Its quality is incentive enough. Standouts include Roddy Doyle's ''The Slave'' and playwright Patrick Marber's ''Peter Shelley,'' a perfect love story about a boy, a girl, and a Buzzcocks single told in the spirit of a punk song. A

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• Book Review Speaking With the Angel | Lisa Levy