Review: A must read book for all.  Parents especially.
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 10 13, 2013
This book absolutely amazed me.It started off for me as a comical retelling of a boy's rather eccentric father.The family is Irish; the mother is a devout Catholic and a woman this side of saintly.The more I read and laughed at the author's ability to use a simple turn of phrase to make a funny situation hilarious the more I noticed that the veneer of comedy masked the true story.The story is about a boy and his relationship with his dad.The boy hero worshiped his dad and the relationship between the two grew stronger with age.The story started off in the late 1950's progressing as the boy grew up and regressing again as new characters and situations were introduced.Given Ireland's' history a reader might expect a very strong political slant to the book and even though it is alluded to it is not a main theme at all.By the end of the book the reader really knows the boy's father.  His strong points, his weaknesses and that not everybody loved him as unconditionally as his wife and children.The boy and how this relationship shaped him and formed him into the man he is to become is a reflection, a shadow of his father and the relationship will haunt the reader.A must read for all readers who likes to look at the funny side of life, love and living.7 * rating if only I could go that high.