62 reviews for:

Maggie-Now

Betty Smith

3.78 AVERAGE


I don't like books with unfinished endings.

It is hard to love a novel when you couldn't care less about the protagonist. And in this novel's protagonist, there just isn't a whole lot there - Maggie-Now is the proverbial doormat, and knowing she enjoys being the doormat doesn't really make her any more compelling. She puts up with a husband who won't tell her who he is, where he came from, where he works, or where he goes when he disappears for 3/4's of the year, and we're supposed to believe that the freshness of the sex when he returns is enough to make up for everything else. I'm not buying it - I don't care how giving and shallow Maggie-Now was supposed to be. Throughout her novels, Smith tells us again and again that you will never regret marrying (or even just sleeping with) the man you're passionate about, but it never seems to work out all that well for the women who take her advice, does it?

A previous reviewer mentioned that the novel lacks cohesion, and that was really just as bothersome as the vapid main character. It wanders first through Pat's life, then Mary's, then inexplicitly dwells on Maggie Now's for the rest of the novel. The fact that Pat is still there, but fades into the background, only to be used for narrative tension and commedic effect when needed, makes the wandering that much more disconcerting. I suppose parallels could be drawn between Claude, the wandering husband, and Betty Smith, the wandering writer, but I really just don't care enough about any of them to go down that road.

But here's what saves the novel from less stars in my book; the last chapter, and especially the last two pages, represent one of the best book endings I have ever read. The scene is vivid, the characters are alive, and for the first time in the book, I was wishing for more. Absolutely brilliant! If only it had followed a more compelling story...

This is a better book than A Tree... in both plot and craft. The main story takes a little while to figure itself out, and I'm still not sure what the point of the whole thing was (both things that the aforementioned Tree had established very well, despite other flaws), but the characters (outside of the protagonist) are deep, varied, and interesting. Maggie-Now herself is a little bland, too much like Francie for her own good despite a few pointed descriptions made to show a distinction between them.

It's a nice story, but I'm trying to imagine recommending to someone that they read this, and I can't think of what kind of person or in what circumstances it would be a good choice. The book doesn't accomplish much, and doesn't seem to know what it was trying to do. It's a lot like Maggie-Now herself, I guess, which has the potential to be staggeringly depressing if you think too much about it.

I really wanted to love this book and unfortunately, I just couldn't. I loved the social history references - life in Ireland pre-immigration. Life in Brooklyn for a greenback. The way young ladies lived in early 20th century. That part was terrific, but the story? Not so much.
Pat is a disgruntled young man who has lived with him mother for far too long. He gets himself in a bit of a pickle and instead of confronting his problem, leaves Ireland for the milk and honey promise of New York. It's not until he arrives that reality sets in and real menial work is part of that reality. Pat has a chip on his shoulder the size of Manhattan which never goes away. He marries up in life, and fruit of that marriage is Maggie-Now, who we only meet after 100 pages or so.
Maggie grows up subservient to her father and an absolute doormat to the person she marries. I didn't particularly like Pat's character, Maggie's character, her little brother's character or her husband's character -- so in the end, there was little to like as far as plot or character development.

This was my first book of 2019. I certainly hope my other choices are better!

Betty Smith is best known as the author of coming-of-age-tale ‘A Tree Grows in Brooklyn’ – which happens to also be one of my most favorite books. For me, it is most important for a book not to have an exciting plot, or an exhilarating climax, but instead to have memorable and well-developed characters – and Betty Smith excels in creating characters. Reading a Betty Smith tale is like sitting down to a girls night discussion and chatting with your closest friends. If you have never read a novel by Betty Smith, you are missing out – and ‘A Tree Grows in Brooklyn’ would be a great place to start. Then move on to ‘Joy in the Morning’ – a real gem – and finally end your Smith-capades with this tale, namely ‘Maggie-Now’. READ MORE

Somewhat depressing, but I enjoyed the writing style and time-period.

I started reading this book probably two years ago, maybe longer and I quit halfway through because I found the story boring. It did not measure up to A Tree Grows In Brooklyn probably because Maggie-Now is is all fiction. The story, for me, didn't get interesting until after where I quit reading. Maggie-Now is a generational story starting with Maggie's father Patrick Dempsey Moore. Patrick Moore is a lazy, pain-in-the-butt, Irish immigrant. He left Ireland because he refused to marry Maggie-Rose, after her brother Timmy threatened him. He comes to America and becomes a stable boy to Moriarty. Moriarty had a daughter named Mary and eventually Patrick married Mary despite the fact that Mary's father absolutely hated Patrick, Their marriage is pitiful and Patrick treats Mary terribly. Mary has a daughter and names her Margaret but her nickname is Maggie-Now. Maggie grows up and when she is sixteen ( I think), her mother gives birth to a boy but dies in childbirth. Maggie raises her brother because her father Patrick is a bitter angry man who takes little to no responsibility for anything. Her brother's name is Denny and Maggie raises him alone until he is ten, then she meets Claude Basset. Claude Basset is not a bad man, he truly loves Maggie but he is a born wonderer, being an orphan, and every spring leaves Maggie to go look for his birth parents. Maggie loves Claude, which is her one fault, and waits for him every year to come home in the winter, then she lets him leave again in the spring. They continue this strange relationship as Danny grows up and Patrick retires. Maggie desperately wants children but she never gets pregnant. Finally one spring she decides to become a foster mother, and a couple of years later her request is granted. Now she has children, but she still loses her husband every spring. Denny becomes a man and decides that he wants to be a butcher and marry his sweetheart Theresa. Claude misses the wedding and the christening of their baby. Patrick marries a widow, and leaves Maggie alone with the foster children. Claude comes home one winter night and tells Maggie that he is done searching because he found what he was looking for but the real reason was because he was sick and dying, Claude dies and Patrick scatters his ashes on the wind.
That sums up the entire book. The story just seemed slow, and Patrick's unreliable nature made a unlikable character. Everything he did made me angry and just wish he would die or disappear from the story so I didn't have to read about him. I liked the character of Maggie-Now because she was a simple person trying to live her life. She was a practical, plain, lovely girl who didn't deserve a husband like Claude. He treated her well, when he was around, but then he would just go and leave her.
There was not a lot of hope in this book. Francie (Tree Grows...) at least rose above her station, but Maggie-Now just stayed where she was, never really moving up in the world. I would hate to say anyone's life was boring but hers was. It is a story about Patrick and Maggie-Now and their lives are just boring. The little details maybe add some spice but while they are most certainly not flat characters they don't do much to improve themselves. I would expect this from Patrick but not from Maggie-Now. While she may be a plain and simple girl, she's not stupid. She could have done much better for herself but she chose not to, which doesn't make any sense to me.
I don't want to say anything bad about Betty Smith but the ending made me think either she got bored with the story as well, or she had a deadline. I suppose it ended because every story does end, but it wasn't a very satisfactory ending. It was rather abrupt with not warning. Claude dies, his ashes are scattered and that is that. As I sit here and think about it, there were some loose ends tied, but whatever became of Maggie? Was not a good portion of the book dedicated to her? And yet nothing is said of what happened to her after Claude died.
This book has some good points and some faults, and while it is not a bad story I wouldn't recommend it to people. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is another story.

I loved A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and have been meaning to read the other books by Betty Smith and finally just got to read Joy in the Morning which was sweet and adorable and Maggie-Now which seemed to start off alright but it had the most peculiar arc.

In Ireland Patrick Moore falls in love with a girl, sort of. He is fond of her just not enough to get married because he's not the commitment type so instead of marrying her he hightails it to America to let things calm down but he ends of staying there because he's broke and stuff. But the girl who was left has a brother who lives in Manhattan near where Patrick is and takes it upon himself to beat him up and then weirdly they become friends. Patrick eventually gets a job working for a man as a stable boy and the man's daughter is taken by Patrick but Patrick has gone and wished he had never left Ireland and wished he married the girl, named Margaret, but when he runs into Margarets brother again and he has news that his little sister is super happy and married a distraught Patrick decides he might as well marry the man's daughter and inherit the business.

The daughter's name is Mary and she and Patrick do marry and eventually have a child who they name Maggie after Margaret (because that makes a lot of sense and who would do that in real life - she knew of Patrick's ex gf and thought she sounded really nice??) but anyway,
here is where the story really begins as we follow the life of Maggie who is a very busy kid and is always being called "Maggie now don't do you do that", "Maggie now come back here this instant!" etc so she's basically called Maggie-Now.

She grows up and when she's a late teen her mother gets pregnant again but dies after. (This isn't much of a spoiler as it happens fairly early). Patrick- who proves to not give a shit about anyone but himself makes Maggie-Now raise the boy as if he were her own. So she's taking care of the house without her mother there, taking care of the boy and dealing with an asshat dad who is so selfish and jealous that he didn't have a different k ind of life and then she meets this man named Claude.
And Claude is a sort of character who is charming and educated but a little manipulative and knows he has a certain affect on the ladies and he has a back story that isn't told until the last 2 pages which felt like it was just thrown in there. Maggie-Now is head over heels in love with Claude and he professes love to her too but then disappears for months. And then comes back and expects everything to be okay and since Maggie-Now is so smitten she'd do anything for me and just lets him do whatever he wants.

The story goes on and on much of the same with Claude and Maggie-Now and I just got tired of it. The end was weird and it lacked so much of the charm of the other books that I just finished it out of respect for the author.

I'm glad I read it because if I didn't I would just keep saying that I will and eventually would have at some point so now it's behind me and I can move on.
emotional reflective sad medium-paced
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Betty Smith's New York City is quaint and beautiful. Her character's are complex, they are loving, and violent, and vulnerable, and honest, and confusing. We learn that we cannot judge other by the standards that we live by, we cannot project our own relationships on others.