Synopsis
Billy Lynch is an alcoholic. At his death, his large Irish Catholic family in Queens tells stories about him--his loyalty, his wacky side, his sad past--trying to understand the roots of his destructive drinking. A New York Times Notable Book for 1998.
| Details | | Publication Date: | 1999-01-01 |
| Size | | Length: | 288 pages | | Height: | 8.3 in | | Width: | 5.5 in | | Thickness: | 0.8 in | | Weight: | 7.2 oz |
Publisher's Note
Everyone loved him. If you knew Billy at all, then you loved him. The late Billy Lynch's family and friends, a party of forty-seven, gather at a small bar and grill somewhere in the Bronx to remember better times in good company, and to redeem the pleasure of a drink or two from the miserable thing that a drink had become in Billy's life. His widow, Maeve, is there and everyone admires the way she is holding up, just as they always admired the way she cared for Billy after the alcohol had ruined him. But one cannot think of Billy Lynch's life, one's own relentless affection for him, without saying at some point, "There was that girl. The Irish girl". And one can't help but think that the real story of his life lay there.
Industry Reviews
"[E]loquent and unsettling....Like its title character, McDermott's novel works on our sympathies with an insistent sadness and an ingratiating charm."
New York Times Book Review - Alida Becker (01/11/1998)
"McDermott fashions her story out of an accumulation of hints and evasions, secrets and lies. Emotions are closeted, muffled, purged. There are no explosive confrontations, no charged recriminations. Yet the drama is enormous, arising from the tension of what isn't said. Billy, an innocent who couldn't fathom that life is neither poetry nor prayer, is the silent center of a superbly crafted novel."
Salon - Dan Cryer (01/09/1998)
"Unfortunately..., the disruptions are too much, the juxtapositions too hectic and too many, and this wobbly novel's stability is lost."
Boston Book Review - Kurt Jensen (01/19/1998)
"McDermott's lyric writing and her intriguing--if somewhat inchoate--reflections on the loss and lie that define Billy's life give the book an intensely quiet power..."
San Francisco Chronicle Book Review - Roz Spafford (01/04/1998)
"A softly resonant and nostalgic tale told so masterfully, so movingly, that it seems to distill a human essence on virtually every page."
Prose
| See an error? Submit a change request |
All rights reserved.
