Book news, reviews and recommendations
A new Alice McDermott is always a treat to be relished. She’s one of those quietly brilliant authors whose work has often seemed underrated to me, rather like Elizabeth Strout before Penguin got their hands on My Name is Lucy Barton and placed her firmly on the literary map. I did spot McDermott’s last novel, […]
The Ninth Hour by Alice McDermott: Praise be Read More »
This is the latest in a series of occasional posts featuring books I read years ago about which I was wildly enthusiastic at the time, wanting to press a copy in as many hands as I could. I was delighted to see piles of Alice McDermott’s Someone stacked up on tables at the front of
Blasts from the Past: Charming Billy by Alice McDermott (1998) Read More »
For me, Alice McDermott belongs to a small, select band of authors who write slim, elegant novels, each word carefully chosen and none wasted. It includes Colm Tóibín, John McGahern and Anne Enright. Perhaps it’s no coincidence that they’re all Irish or of Irish extraction although Helen Dunmore is no slouch at this kind of
Someone by Alice McDermott: A quiet masterpiece Read More »