Nick Hornby’s “A Long Way Down” is the most entertaining book I’ve ever read about suicide.

It is one of those books I picked up off a bookstore shelf a year ago, didn’t buy, and looked at it every single time I went to a bookstore after that. The premise of four people deciding independently to jump off the same building on the same night, only to obviously run into one another is an intriguing start to a story.

Having each of those four people serve as narrators in a sort of rotating fashion is not only an interesting way to tell the story, but also pretty impressive. These are four really different people, and effectively finding a voice for each to be able to move the story is an accomplishment.

I probably dog-eared more pages in this book than any other this year. That means I was either really into it, or had near rage blackouts because it infuriated me so much. Fortunately, Hornby is a pretty solid writer so it was more in the “enjoyed” category.

I have written before about modern society’s need for everyone to be great, for kids to be special and for everyone to think they deserve everything. One of the characters, JJ, just broke up with his girlfriend on the heels of having his band fall apart: “The trouble with my generation is that we all think we’re fucking geniuses. Making something isn’t good enough for us, and neither is selling something, or teaching something, or even just doing something; we have to be something. It’s our inalienable right, as citizens of the twenty-first century.”

When I was “just” selling shoes, I heard a lot of “why aren’t you” kind of talk. But the reality was, despite certain frustrations specific to that company, it really wasn’t such a bad deal. It was something I was great at, got me a discount on things I used, put me in touch with new people every day with a chance to help them and often allowed me to wake up without an alarm. Plus it was the closest I will ever work to a Taco Bell.

Just a few pages later, a teenage girl named Jess is taking care of the narrating duties. This is one of those writing challenges I find fascinating — how an older male puts himself believably in the shoes of a teenage girl. She’s talking about the group of four potential jumpers, and the propensity for people to label individuals in certain sized groups according to popular culture. In this case, who in the group would be which member of The Beatles. Years ago you could have heard your friends posit on which “Friends” cast member each would be, or which “Sex & The City” gal best matched you. But being fictional characters, there’s always a flaw to this approach and Jess quickly realizes it’s not going to work out. “Thinking about it, maybe we were more like another group with four people in it,” she said.

Of course one of the great things about writers with multiple books is being able to draw parallels between them. Last year I read Hornby’s “How to be Good,” featuring the amazing character DJ GoodNews. And who should make a cameo appearance on page 181? The one and only DJ GoodNews. I practically shouted his name in excitement.

For some reason I found the inner thoughts of Jess to be the most insightful. She alienates all of her friends, her sister ran away from home and her parents sort of wrote her off as a lost cause. She talks about the benefit of having large chain stores instead of more personal, mom-and-pop kinds of places: “I like to know that there are big places without windows where no one gives a shit. I’m happiest…where no one gives a shit, and no one knows who you are. My mum and dad are always going on about how soulless those places are, and I’m like, Der. That’s the point.”

I also like her frequent use of the word “der.” When I moved to Jacksonville a few years ago, I went to a place where I knew absolutely nobody. Some people would find this absolutely frightening and would never try it. I know some of my friends said they couldn’t do it. But I will say there was a certain interesting dynamic knowing you could go to a store, the beach, a restaurant or just walk down the street and be 100 percent positive you would not run into someone you know. That also helps when you’re hungry and don’t feel like showering or even putting on clean clothes before going to the grocery store.

Jess also talks about how her dad always said she could do anything or be anything (despite what JJ may have said about that notion). But in the end, there are certain characteristics that always bring us back to who we really are. No matter how much you try to remove the barriers, at some point we just can’t get out of our own ways. She says: “Telling me I can do anything is like pulling the plug out of the bath and then telling the water it can go anywhere it wants. Try it, and see what happens.”

I’m always a sucker for a good rant about people who aren’t into reading and look down upon those who do. And through JJ, Hornby delivers: “Why does reading freak people out so much? Sure, I could be pretty antisocial when we were on the road, but if I was playing a Game Boy hour after hour, no one would be on my case. In my social circle, blowing up fucking space monsters is socially acceptable in a way that ‘American Pastoral’ isn’t.” Amen.

Doing the daily crossword in the Washington Post always makes me wonder how on Earth I know certain random pieces of information. It’s like being with a group of people who have no expectation that you would know one of their other friends, or have heard of their obscure college. They always ask, “how did you know…” The explanation is always longer than it should be and would usually be better if accompanied by graphs and charts.

Hornby delivers one of these for me on page 196 with the line “Or that Australian girl who used to be on ‘Neighbours.'” I am not from Australia, or from England where this story takes place. I have never seen “Neighbours.” But I know he’s talking about Delta Goodrem. How I know this would take a solid 5,000 words to explain, and perhaps someday I’ll do that. But I will share a bit about Delta.

For anyone who has been in search of “the next step” in life, be it between jobs or just out of school, you know there is advice coming to you from every direction. You have heard it for years — talk to this person, take this class, get an internship, don’t do be like him, market yourself, break up with that guy, blah blah blah. Delta’s song “In My Own Time” begins: “So much is happening to me, so much that I can’t even see, so many words of wisdom that I am trying to be.”

And that’s sort of what these four characters are going through. There is a lot going on in their lives, a lot of thoughts swirling in their heads and a lot of opinions as to what they should be doing. It is up to them to figure out how to put it all together, and be.