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3.99 AVERAGE
3.99 AVERAGE
I was fascinated by McCourt's ability to recapture the voice and perspective of himself as a youngster; this is really interesting from a writing craft standpoint. I learned a lot about Ireland in the mid 1900s and was heartbroken by the McCourts' realities, too. However, I struggled to get through this book and found it just okay.
I didn't like this. It's my own fault, however. I very rarely enjoy non-fiction. Even more rarely do I enjoy memoirs. Listening to this book was a bad idea from the start, so it's really no surprise that a month and some change later, I'm simply giving up on it.
I love this story. I know the basics, I've seen the movie, I read the cliff notes. The story is... amazing. It is simultaneously depressing and uplifting. I only wish the telling of it didn't put me to sleep.
Don't take my word for it, go read some other reviews before you make a decision about whether to read this book or not. Preferably reviews written by people who actually like non-fiction/memoirs.
I love this story. I know the basics, I've seen the movie, I read the cliff notes. The story is... amazing. It is simultaneously depressing and uplifting. I only wish the telling of it didn't put me to sleep.
Don't take my word for it, go read some other reviews before you make a decision about whether to read this book or not. Preferably reviews written by people who actually like non-fiction/memoirs.
What a terribly sad book. I am surprised anyone survived. I am so glad times have changed, because I'd be damned if my husband would drink away the money and my kids starve. No way! There's a few funny parts in the book, but not many.
2021 POPSUGAR reading challenge- A bestseller from the 1990s
emotional
reflective
medium-paced
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death
Moderate: Alcoholism
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
I have the same issue with this book as I did with 'Tis. It was presented to me in a way that made it seem like it was an essential read and a classic piece of memoir literature. I did not feel that way about it at all. It was an okay book, and I do not want to negate the experiences of the author by saying a bunch of negative things simply because it didn't meet my expectation.
dark
reflective
sad
slow-paced
It's the quintessential tale of poverty, misery, and childhood neglect. I love the TV series Derry Girls by Lisa McGee. If you’ve seen it you’ll remember the character Uncle Colm who infamously and incessantly drones on with his life’s anecdotes until his family is bored to literal tears. He must have been modeled after Frank McCourt. The content of the book is straightforward, a laundry list of nearly unimaginable wretchedness, suffering, and deprivation the author suffered growing up impoverished in Limerick, Ireland in the 1940s. Whatever the woes of poverty you can imagine, it’s way worse than that. Seriously, I’ve read quite a few of these sufferer’s journals and this one is almost cartoonishly excessive. Only it’s not that emotionally affecting, and that’s a problem with style. Firstly, the book is narrated entirely in a child’s voice, and children aren’t great at developing depth in storytelling or characterization. Playing into that McCourt’s technique in narrative is simply to move from one event to the next, to the next, to the next. It’s as if he tries to include every single childhood memory he could conjure without regard to how it might fit into an overall story arc. He never once slows down to fully develop a scene to allow it to make an emotional imprint. Nevertheless, the details of his childhood suffering are beyond harrowing, and he includes a good bit of humor from time to time too, though overall it's mainly a depressing slog. Douglas Stuart's Shuggie Bain does it better.
McCourt nimmt sich einer kindlich, naiven Perspektive an, die durch seine Sprache und auch die oberflächliche Betrachtung der Geschehnisse gestützt wird, und berichtet authentisch von seinem Aufwachsen im von Armut geprägten Irland der 1930er/1940er Jahre. Gerade die Jahre seiner Kindheit beschreibt er sehr detailliert, einige Erlebnisse wirken daher sehr redundant, die Schilderungen fast langatmig, für seine Jugend reichen einige schnelle Kapitel zum Ende hin. Es gab einige wenige Szenen, in denen ein eher reflektierter McCourt zum Vorschein kommt, in denen eingeordnet, fast schon bewertet, wird, und genau diese Stellen sind für mich die stärksten des Buches. Hätte er nur mehr solcher Momente gehabt und dem Ganzen einen Titel, der nicht komplett irreführend ist, gegeben, ich hätte das Buch vermutlich etwas mehr gemocht.
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced