At Weddings and Wakes

At Weddings and Wakes

Author: Alice McDermott

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Published: 2009-11-24

Total Pages: 229

ISBN-13: 1429929626

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The three children of an Irish-American family in Long Island are witnesses to the cycles of dissatisfaction, bitterness and recurring affection that make up the lives of their extended family. A tender, sad and funny book from the author of the National Book Award-nominated That Night and Charming Billy


That Night

That Night

Author: Alice McDermott

Publisher: A&C Black

Published: 2013-11-21

Total Pages: 192

ISBN-13: 1408853655

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'A stunning work' Sunday Times 'That Night has universal appeal ... there is a depth of feeling here which is beautifully - and seriously - realised' Independent ______________________ The evocative second novel from National Book Award winner Alice McDermott On a warm suburban night, the sound of lawn sprinklers is drowned out by the rumble of hot rods. Suddenly, a car careens onto a family's neat front yard, teenage boys spill out brandishing chains and leather, and a young man cries out for the girl he loves. Tonight, fathers will pick up snow shovels and rakes to defend their turf, and children will witness a battle fuelled by fierce, true love. This is the night they will talk about and remember as the moment things changed for ever.


After This

After This

Author: Alice McDermott

Publisher: Dial Press

Published: 2007-09-25

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 0440337305

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On a wild, windy April day in Manhattan, when Mary first meets John Keane, she cannot know what lies ahead of her. A marriage, a fleeting season of romance, and the birth of four children will bring John and Mary to rest in the safe embrace of a traditional Catholic life in the suburbs. But neither Mary nor John, distracted by memories and longings, can feel the wind that is buffeting their children, leading them in directions beyond their parents’ control. Michael and his sister Annie are caught up in the sexual revolution. Jacob, brooding and frail, is drafted to Vietnam. And the youngest, Clare, commits a stunning transgression after a childhood spent pleasing her parents. As John and Mary struggle to hold on to their family and their faith, Alice McDermott weaves an elegant, unforgettable portrait of a world in flux–and of the secrets and sorrows, anger and love, that lie at the heart of every family.


Don't Sneeze at the Wedding

Don't Sneeze at the Wedding

Author: Pamela Mayer

Publisher: Kar-Ben Publishing ™

Published: 2014-01-01

Total Pages: 36

ISBN-13: 1512488364

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Anna is excited to be the flower girl at her aunt’s wedding, but that morning she wakes up and ... achoo! “Don’t sneeze at the wedding!” everyone warns her, but will their remedies work?


The Ninth Hour

The Ninth Hour

Author: Alice McDermott

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Published: 2017-09-19

Total Pages: 257

ISBN-13: 0374712174

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A magnificent new novel from one of America’s finest writers—a powerfully affecting story spanning the twentieth century of a widow and her daughter and the nuns who serve their Irish-American community in Brooklyn. On a dim winter afternoon, a young Irish immigrant opens a gas tap in his Brooklyn tenement. He is determined to prove—to the subway bosses who have recently fired him, to his pregnant wife—that “the hours of his life . . . belonged to himself alone.” In the aftermath of the fire that follows, Sister St. Saviour, an aging nun, a Little Nursing Sister of the Sick Poor, appears, unbidden, to direct the way forward for his widow and his unborn child. In Catholic Brooklyn in the early part of the twentieth century, decorum, superstition, and shame collude to erase the man’s brief existence, and yet his suicide, though never spoken of, reverberates through many lives—testing the limits and the demands of love and sacrifice, of forgiveness and forgetfulness, even through multiple generations. Rendered with remarkable delicacy, heart, and intelligence, Alice McDermott’s The Ninth Hour is a crowning achievement of one of the finest American writers at work today.


Charming Billy

Charming Billy

Author: Alice McDermott

Publisher: Delta

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 257

ISBN-13: 038533334X

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Praised in the highest terms by reviewers, the story of a charming, romantic Irish American explores the impact of his life and death on his family and his close-knit New York City neighborhood. Reprint.


Other People's Weddings

Other People's Weddings

Author: Noah Hawley

Publisher: St. Martin's Press

Published: 2005-06

Total Pages: 292

ISBN-13: 9780312322748

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A modern love story about a woman who photographs other people's weddings and meets the ultimate wedding party crasher.


Someone

Someone

Author: Alice McDermott

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Published: 2013-09-10

Total Pages: 242

ISBN-13: 1429969423

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A fully realized portrait of one woman's life in all its complexity, by the National Book Award–winning author An ordinary life—its sharp pains and unexpected joys, its bursts of clarity and moments of confusion—lived by an ordinary woman: this is the subject of Someone, Alice McDermott's extraordinary return, seven years after the publication of After This. Scattered recollections—of childhood, adolescence, motherhood, old age—come together in this transformative narrative, stitched into a vibrant whole by McDermott's deft, lyrical voice. Our first glimpse of Marie is as a child: a girl in glasses waiting on a Brooklyn stoop for her beloved father to come home from work. A seemingly innocuous encounter with a young woman named Pegeen sets the bittersweet tone of this remarkable novel. Pegeen describes herself as an "amadan," a fool; indeed, soon after her chat with Marie, Pegeen tumbles down her own basement stairs. The magic of McDermott's novel lies in how it reveals us all as fools for this or that, in one way or another. Marie's first heartbreak and her eventual marriage; her brother's brief stint as a Catholic priest, subsequent loss of faith, and eventual breakdown; the Second World War; her parents' deaths; the births and lives of Marie's children; the changing world of her Irish-American enclave in Brooklyn—McDermott sketches all of it with sympathy and insight. This is a novel that speaks of life as it is daily lived; a crowning achievement by one of the finest American writers at work today. A Publishers Weekly Best Fiction Book of the Year A Kirkus Reviews Best Fiction Book of 2013 A New York Times Notable Book of 2013 A Washington Post Notable Fiction Book of 2013 An NPR Best Book of 2013


My Father's Wake

My Father's Wake

Author: Kevin Toolis

Publisher: Da Capo Press

Published: 2018-02-27

Total Pages: 194

ISBN-13: 0306921456

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An intimate, lyrical look at the ancient rite of the Irish wake--and the Irish way of overcoming our fear of death Death is a whisper for most of us. Instinctively we feel we should dim the lights, pull the curtains, and speak softly. But on a remote island off the coast of Ireland's County Mayo, death has a louder voice. Each day, along with reports of incoming Atlantic storms, the local radio runs a daily roll call of the recently departed. The islanders go in great numbers, young and old alike, to be with their dead. They keep vigil with the corpse and the bereaved company through the long hours of the night. They dig the grave with their own hands and carry the coffin on their own shoulders. The islanders cherish the dead--and amid the sorrow, they celebrate life, too. In My Father's Wake, acclaimed author and award-winning filmmaker Kevin Toolis unforgettably describes his own father's wake and explores the wider history and significance of this ancient and eternal Irish ritual. Perhaps we, too, can all find a better way to deal with our mortality -- by living and loving as the Irish do.


Charming Billy

Charming Billy

Author: Alice McDermott

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Published: 2009-11-24

Total Pages: 261

ISBN-13: 1429929707

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Charming Billy is the winner of the 1998 National Book Award for Fiction. Alice McDermott's striking novel, Charming Billy, is a study of the lies that bind and the weight of familial love, of the way good intentions can be as destructive as the truth they were meant to hide. Billy Lynch's family and friends have gathered to comfort his widow, and to pay their respects to one of the last great romantics. As they trade tales of his famous humor, immense charm, and consuming sorrow, a complex portrait emerges of an enigmatic man, a loyal friend, a beloved husband, an incurable alcoholic.