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 does nurture in Frank an appetite for the one thing he can provide: a story.

Perhaps it is a story that accounts for Frank's survival. Wearing shoes repaired with tires, begging a pig's head for Christmas dinner, and searching the pubs for his father, 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.

My thoughts
There was a buy 2 get a 3rd book free sale at the local bookstore. My daughter had chosen one book from the sale table, so I quickly searched the stacks, picked up two books, zipped over to the checkout and headed home. A few weeks later I saw Angela's Ashes on the table and decided to read a few pages. I was hooked!

Can anyone lament like the Irish? I think not! The entire book is the story of too much drink and not enough money, and yet the author tells the story in such a manner that you can't wait to read the next page! When I try to summarize the book to someone, I can't outline a plot because there really isn't one! Too much drink, too little money, a lot of illness and death -- doesn't make for a great referral! And yet as soon as I finished the book I ordered the movie and the book sequel. I don't know if I'll like either, but I'm not quite ready to give up Angela's Ashes just yet!

Favorite Passage
It's cold and wet down in Ireland but we're up in Italy. Mam says we should bring the poor Pope up to hang on the wall opposite the window. After all he's a friend of the workingman, he's Italian, and they're a warm weather people. Mam sits by the fire, shivering, and we know something is wrong when she makes no move for a cigarette. She says she feels a cold coming and she'd love to have a tarty drink, a lemonade. But there's no money in the house, not even for bread in the morning. She drinks tea and goes to bed.

The bed creaks all night with her twistings and turnings and she keeps us awake with her moaning for water. In the morning, she stays in bed, still shivering, and we keep quiet. If she sleeps long enough Malachy and I will be too late for school. Hours pass and still she makes no move and when I know it's well past school time I start the fire for the kettle. She stirs and calls for lemonade but I give her a jam jar of water. I ask her if she'd like some tea and she acts like a woman gone deaf. She looks flushed and it's odd she doesn't even mention cigarettes.