At Wedding and Wakes (Abridged) Audiobook

" Tried but gave up. "

" McDermott is a good writer and this is a wistful, nostalgic book about a different place (NYC), a different time (1950s), and a different family (Irish immigrants). The author evokes the weekly visits to the children's grandmother and aunts so clearly that I can smell it and taste it. Though it's a book where not much happens, at least not on the surface, tragedies and regrets small and large permeate it. The three children must endure visit after visit as their mother, mismatched in marriage, cries about their father, until he comes to get them and bring them home. Even mourning becomes routinized. I enjoyed the trip down memory lane, but found the mournful tone sad. "

" Intriguing temporal/structural strategies in this book, kind of like a Rubik's cube. But the atmosphere of it was SO claustrophobic! I kind of hurried to get through it so I could get out of there, as I was feeling suffocated by the details as filtered (and often repeated) through child-consciousness. And not just one child, but three, experiencing their family stories in a way that winds up holding the emotional impact of the family dramas at a distance. So I found out what happened, but as through a glass darkly. I'm sure it captured the mood of time and place and this particular family, but . . . whew! Relieved to be done with it, in the way I was relieved as a child that the drive was over, or school was out. She really does capture what that feels like to be so flooded and fascinated and baffled by the minutiae of experience, so at the mercy of surrounding adults, so likely to make innocent errors you're desperate to avoid, so often trapped and . . . that word again . . . suffocated by family and culture's expectations, rules, scrutiny, judgments and demands. I gave it 3 stars, but 2.5 would be more accurate. Teetering on the edge. "

" It took me a while to get my bearings on this book. The author's change in the tenses made it hard to know what was happening, what had happened, or what was going to happen. I finally got into the rhythm of the book and then I found it hard to put down. "

" This book is amazing as it breaks my heart. All you Catholics from Nassau County who summered in the hamptons and had relatives in the city, read this book. [close:] "

" I found this book very difficult to follow. "

" Not for lovers of plot, but beautifully written. "

" This book has a very quiet feel to it. It is a story of three generations of a family told through the eyes of the children. It is told backwards in a sense and at times it is a little confusing as to when certain events take place. "

" I love Alice McDermott. Everything she does is brilliant, and although I liked After This better than At Weddings and Wakes, I still thought this was a phenomenal book. "

" A somewhat rambling, slice-of-life story about a family in New York in the 40's. "

" A lesson in writing perspective... cuts wide open with little slits and stabs. amazing. "

" I like the author's writing style. However, there really was no story told. This book slowly went no where. "

" This book bored me to tears, and for goodness sake, couldn't she have given her poor characters some names? "

" Lovely prose, almost so well written as to negate a plotless book that focuses on prosaic minutia instead of fully investing these stereotypical characters with backstories. "

" A great look into an Irish Catholic family in 1950s Brooklyn. An awesome read! "

" Honestly, this was the most painful book I have ever read. It made me wonder why I can't stop in the middle of a book. "

" beautifully written but can't say I really ever cared about any of the characters. zzzz..... "

" this one was a little slow-moving. it's a nice story, but none of the characters are really fleshed-out at all, and i found myself choosing other activities over reading because i wasn't drawn back to the book. "