To most, High Fidelity is an excellent film with a great soundtrack starring John Cusack.

But before Championship Vinyl was in Chicago, few realize that it was originally located in London in Nick Hornby's 1995 novel.

The literary High Fidelity is an astonishingly wonderful portrait of Rob Fleming, owner of said record store and erstwhile romantic and music junkie.

We join Rob at a bit of a bad time for him. His business is bad, as always, and his girlfriend, Laura, has left him. Things are not looking up.

The novel begins with Rob recounting his "desert-island, all-time, top five most memorable split-ups" -- just like the film. Only now, the reader gets an even fuller and more fascinating view of Rob's psyche.

Rob searches high and low for the reasons why these breakups keep happening.

The reader gets to see his faults and his frailties.

Hornby creates a fantastically real character.

He's not the perfect protagonist of so many novels, but his faults make him much more likable than any cookie-cutter perfect hero.

Rob's employees at Championship Vinyl, Dick and Barry, provide plenty of highlights. Their opposite personality types make for many memorable and funny scenes.

The three are constantly making top five lists. They make lists on everything and it's only a matter of time before the reader starts to mentally join in with his or her own lists whether they're about favorite episodes of Cheers or Elvis Costello songs.

(I couldn't help but think of how disappointed Rob would've been at the obviousness of my own Costello list: "Deep Dark Truthful Mirror," "I Want You," "Watching the Detectives," "New Amsterdam" and "Radio Radio.")

The true heart of the novel, though, is not really the story so much as Rob's thoughts. This is the kind of book that you cannot put down and when you do, you half-expect to run into the main character in the hall.

Rob's pining for Laura takes him to memorable mental anguish. He calls ex-girlfriends. He calls her apartment and hangs up. The sections of the book dealing with his innermost thoughts (and that's most of the book) are so incredibly well written that you can pick up the book and literally read any paragraph for an example of the power of the writing.

And the most amazing thing is that it was journalist Hornby's first novel.

There's nothing not to love about this book. It's smart. It's funny. It has incredible characters. It has pop culture references galore.

And it's sure to end up on several of your own top five lists.