Author Anna Qundlen has said that she enjoys reading “the Alices,” a list that includes Alice Munro, Alice Hoffman and Alice McDermott. McDermott won the National Book Award in 1998 for “Charming Billy,” a lovely book about an affable Irishman with an alcohol problem. Her latest effort is “After This,” a book that she spoke about last fall at the National Book Festival in Washington.
She writes what she knows, which is Irish-Catholic families, and “After This” follows the Keane family. Reading this book is like looking through a family photo album, with each snapshot recounting a different event that happened in the family.
We meet Mary right after World War II. She works as a secretary in New York City, where she does her best to tolerate coworker Pauline, a busybody with a sour attitude. At night, she goes home to cook dinner for her brother and widowed father. We follow her as she has a rare dinner date with George, a friend of her brother. It is a fairly lonely life.
But it is a man she meets at a diner during lunch that catches her eye. John is a World War II veteran who lost two toes in combat. After exchanging a few brief words with John one day, Mary is surprised to find him waiting outside the diner the next day.
Turn the page to the next photo and John and Mary are newlyweds, learning to share their lives together. In the next photo, we see John, a very pregnant Mary and their three children, Jacob, Michael and Annie, enjoying a day at the beach.
John is concerned about his oldest son. Jacob is smaller than his younger brother, less athletic and not as good of a student. He seems timid and fearful of everyday happenings. Michael is a typical boy, rough and tumble and he enjoys tormenting his older brother.
McDermott's writing is precise and evocative. She describes John's love for his children as love that “bore down on his heart with the weight of three heavy stones.” Every parent can understand those feelings.
The next photo is the birth of baby Clare, a harrowing experience that takes place in the family living room with a neighbor, a male nurse, who luckily shows up just in time to assist. Mary's sour friend Pauline comes to take care of the family while Mary and the baby are in the hospital. Pauline has only become more rigid as she has aged. She has remained unmarried to no one's surprise, and her constant criticism of everyone grates on the Keanes. Mary tells her children that they must be kind to Pauline, as Jesus would want them to.
Faith is an integral part of the Keane family. The children attend Catholic school and it is during this point in America, the 1960s, that many Catholic churches and schools experienced a rapid growth. John becomes a member of the Building Committee at his church. His job is to convince fellow parishioners to contribute to the building fund that will add on a new gymnasium to the school and build an entirely new, modern, in-the-round church. Catholics who remember that time period will find familiar ground here.
One of the most touching scenes is when Jacob, who is preparing to go to Vietnam, takes little sister Clare out of school for the day and drives around town with her. We see this scene from Clare's point of view as she shares this special memory of a brother she doesn't know well.
We learn that Jacob was named after a young man from John's army unit. McDermott connects the fate of these men through their common name. John loves his oldest son, even if he doesn't understand him. A quiet scene where Jacob talks with his injured father, who is proud but unwilling to admit how much pain he is in, exemplifies their relationship.
The children grow up in the late 1960s, a period of rapid changes with social and political upheavals. Michael becomes a teacher, and spends too much of his free time at a small, local bar in the town where is a student-teacher. Annie attends college in London and becomes entranced by a literature professor and her husband. Claire and her high school boyfriend get themselves into a difficult situation.
I enjoy Alice McDermott's novels, and I think that “After This” is my favorite. She uses perfectly chosen words to give us a quiet look at one family's existence and how much love and faith play a part in that life. The title even comes from a prayer: “To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve, to thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears. Turn then, most gracious advocate, thine eyes of mercy toward us, and after this our exile show unto us the blessed fruits of they womb.” Michael says that these words “you could dismiss as a joke as readily as you could claim them as a precise definition of everything you wanted.” I give it four stars.
Auburn native Diane La Rue's lifelong goal is to read a book a week. If you have suggestions, e-mail her at laruediane2000@yahoo.com
We meet Mary right after World War II. She works as a secretary in New York City, where she does her best to tolerate coworker Pauline, a busybody with a sour attitude. At night, she goes home to cook dinner for her brother and widowed father. We follow her as she has a rare dinner date with George, a friend of her brother. It is a fairly lonely life.
But it is a man she meets at a diner during lunch that catches her eye. John is a World War II veteran who lost two toes in combat. After exchanging a few brief words with John one day, Mary is surprised to find him waiting outside the diner the next day.
Turn the page to the next photo and John and Mary are newlyweds, learning to share their lives together. In the next photo, we see John, a very pregnant Mary and their three children, Jacob, Michael and Annie, enjoying a day at the beach.
John is concerned about his oldest son. Jacob is smaller than his younger brother, less athletic and not as good of a student. He seems timid and fearful of everyday happenings. Michael is a typical boy, rough and tumble and he enjoys tormenting his older brother.
McDermott's writing is precise and evocative. She describes John's love for his children as love that “bore down on his heart with the weight of three heavy stones.” Every parent can understand those feelings.
The next photo is the birth of baby Clare, a harrowing experience that takes place in the family living room with a neighbor, a male nurse, who luckily shows up just in time to assist. Mary's sour friend Pauline comes to take care of the family while Mary and the baby are in the hospital. Pauline has only become more rigid as she has aged. She has remained unmarried to no one's surprise, and her constant criticism of everyone grates on the Keanes. Mary tells her children that they must be kind to Pauline, as Jesus would want them to.
Faith is an integral part of the Keane family. The children attend Catholic school and it is during this point in America, the 1960s, that many Catholic churches and schools experienced a rapid growth. John becomes a member of the Building Committee at his church. His job is to convince fellow parishioners to contribute to the building fund that will add on a new gymnasium to the school and build an entirely new, modern, in-the-round church. Catholics who remember that time period will find familiar ground here.
One of the most touching scenes is when Jacob, who is preparing to go to Vietnam, takes little sister Clare out of school for the day and drives around town with her. We see this scene from Clare's point of view as she shares this special memory of a brother she doesn't know well.
We learn that Jacob was named after a young man from John's army unit. McDermott connects the fate of these men through their common name. John loves his oldest son, even if he doesn't understand him. A quiet scene where Jacob talks with his injured father, who is proud but unwilling to admit how much pain he is in, exemplifies their relationship.
The children grow up in the late 1960s, a period of rapid changes with social and political upheavals. Michael becomes a teacher, and spends too much of his free time at a small, local bar in the town where is a student-teacher. Annie attends college in London and becomes entranced by a literature professor and her husband. Claire and her high school boyfriend get themselves into a difficult situation.
I enjoy Alice McDermott's novels, and I think that “After This” is my favorite. She uses perfectly chosen words to give us a quiet look at one family's existence and how much love and faith play a part in that life. The title even comes from a prayer: “To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve, to thee do we send up our sighs, mourning and weeping in this valley of tears. Turn then, most gracious advocate, thine eyes of mercy toward us, and after this our exile show unto us the blessed fruits of they womb.” Michael says that these words “you could dismiss as a joke as readily as you could claim them as a precise definition of everything you wanted.” I give it four stars.
Auburn native Diane La Rue's lifelong goal is to read a book a week. If you have suggestions, e-mail her at laruediane2000@yahoo.com
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