Angela's Ashes

A Pulitzer Prize–winning, #1 New York Times bestseller, Angela’s Ashes is Frank McCourt’s masterful memoir of his childhood in Ireland—now with a new introduction by Patrick Radden Keefe.

“When I look back on my childhood I wonder how I managed to survive at all. It was, of course, a miserable childhood: the happy childhood is hardly worth your while. Worse than the ordinary miserable childhood is the miserable Irish childhood, and worse yet is the miserable Irish Catholic childhood.”

So begins the luminous memoir of Frank McCourt, born in Depression-era Brooklyn to recent Irish immigrants and raised in the slums of Limerick, Ireland. Frank’s mother, Angela, has no money to feed the children since Frank’s father, Malachy, rarely works, and when he does he drinks his wages. Yet Malachy—exasperating, irresponsible, and beguiling—does nurture in Frank an appetite for the one thing he can provide: a story. Frank lives for his father’s tales of Cuchulain, who saved Ireland, and of the Angel on the Seventh Step, who brings his mother babies.

Perhaps it is story that accounts for Frank’s survival. Wearing rags for diapers, begging a pig’s head for Christmas dinner and gathering coal from the roadside to light a fire, Frank endures poverty, near-starvation and the casual cruelty of relatives and neighbors—yet lives to tell his tale with eloquence, exuberance, and remarkable forgiveness.

Angela’s Ashes, imbued on every page with Frank McCourt’s astounding humor and compassion, is a glorious book that bears all the marks of a classic.

Thank you Frank McCourt!

The draw of this book has everything to do with the writer's incredible talent for colorful and moving story telling, and a writing style that comes alive with McCourt's uncomplicated and free flowing Irish accented narration. Frank McCourt's amazing life story is a not just a must-read, but a Classic.

Double your pleasure

I'm sitting here having just finished listening to the book, trying to organize my thoughts for this quick review. It's tough, though, as McCourt's lyrical prose -- and masterful narration -- are ringing so loudly in my head that everything else is eclipsed.

I can guarantee, absolutely, you won't be disappointed in the time you invest to sit through ANGELA'S ASHES (unless, of course, you're from the north, or some kind of a presbyterian).

Fun Fiction Tale for this Non-Fiction Lover

As a regular non-fiction reader, I was delighted by this story and found myself very eager to get back in the car to listen to more. The autobiographical nature and the author reading his own work really gave this selection the "real" story that I prefer in non-fiction. My only criticism is that the story ended rather abruptly, leaving me in a state of severe withdrawal. I do not like to read books and then see the movies, or vice versa, as I feel I blur the author's original intentions, but I find myself really craving to see this movie. I have since figured out that the author continues his tale in the book "Tis." I won't be able to download that fast enough.

Great story about a life I would never want...

Frank McCourt is a fabulous writer and a superb narrator of his own story. Unfortunately, his story is so depressing that I simply can't give it a five star rating. Growing up in Ireland where the Catholic Church seems to influence every aspect of life creates an atmosphere of oppression and lost hope. Having a father who is a drunk and and a mother who keeps having children with no real way to care for them adds to the depression of the story. Yet other reviewers talk of Mr. McCourt's forgiveness, which I do not understand nor see. Great writing. Great narration. Horrible story. Thanks anyway, but I think it's time for another romance novel...

A story of despair and truimph

This book is one of the best I've read in years. However, one must be prepared for the painful story the author tells about his life. I know I felt very lucky for my childhood when compared to Frank McCourt's.

However, the shining star of the book is Frank himself. He overcame the odds and wrote a wonderful narrative to a story of adversity, sorrow, and ultimately triumph.