The Boatman by Billy O'Callaghan

Even without Mei in the room, her presence blocked out the space the way sand fills an hourglass, turning everything slow. That's how I wanted it to be, and that at least was what I'd have, but I knew from before, from having already lost her once, such ghosts tormented as much as consoled. We'd taken an important step in reconnecting and had sworn we wouldn't let that flag, so that it would be different this time, better even if still a long way from ideal, but keeping our promise meant condemning ourselves to a famished life, to the scraps that could nourish only the most fragile of hearts. 

~from "Ruins", p. 44 of The Boatman

I chose an excerpt from the story "Ruins" in The Boatman by Billy O'Callaghan at random because when I was reading I was so immersed that it never occurred to me to get up and look for flags to mark favorite passages. Instead, I read them over and over for their sheer beauty. But, this is what you most need to know about The Boatman: it is carefully, meticulously crafted, rhythmic and melancholy and absolutely stunning.

A few of the stories:

"The Border Fox" - A young man goes over the border into Northern Ireland with a group, to make a delivery. A tense story of subterfuge, violence, and budding romance. 

"The Boatman" - Two men walk to a graveyard to dig the grave of the boatman's daughter, who died very quickly after becoming ill. "She was only young," her uncle keeps repeating. A heartrending tale of grief and the physical labor that becomes a part of the grieving process. 

"Beginish" - A young couple, madly in love and still newlyweds, work hard at two jobs each to save money for a proper holiday. When they decide to stay close to home and camp out on an abandoned island, the man from whom they rent a boat is friendly though mildly concerned. But, neither he nor the young couple expect the tragedy they're about to encounter. 

"Love is Strange" - A teenager is compelled to help an elderly neighbor who regularly struggles up the hill to her home with her purchases. A few years later, he goes out with a neighbor girl and they talk about the old woman. 

I realize, after writing about these 4 stories, that all of them are favorites from the dozen in the book. But, I can't think of any story in The Boatman that I disliked. "Beginish" was the one story in the collection that I could imagine expanded to novel length and perhaps even turned into a movie. It's tragic, as are many of the stories. But, I was so swept away by the incredible beauty of O'Callaghan's writing that for once I thought more about the sound, rhythm and uniqueness of his wording than about the direction each story took. Having said that, all are compelling and at least two had an "edge of your seat" feel. 

Speaking of tragedy . . . if you've hung around here for a while, you know I generally rate anything tragic that lacks a glimpse of hope lower than I do those that give you some sense of light at the end of the tunnel. I gave The Boatman 5 stars, which just goes to show that truly amazing writing will win out, even if a story is gut-wrenching. That surprised me, actually. 

Highly recommended - This one's going on the good shelves and I will definitely return to it for future rereading. 

Important note: I posted about this book on Instagram, yesterday, and one of the photos I posted was of the book posed with a record album (vinyl, that is) and music box that my mother brought home from Ireland, way back when I was a tiny tyke. I listened to the album as a child and remembered the tune to the title song but none of the words. After I posted, I found the title cut on YouTube to listen to and hoo boy, it could be considered extremely offensive in some quarters. It's about a man going off to join the IRA. Since I don't mean to take sides in any way, that post will come down. I was really shocked. It has such a jaunty tune that I had no idea what it was about. In fact, the words "where the helmets glisten in the sun" was one of those phrases that my little-kid brain turned into something else, although there is no such thing as a "Hal man" that glistens in the sun . . . and I didn't remember what my mind had turned it to till I heard the song for the first time in decades. Apologies to any Irish citizens who may have seen that post and found it offensive. 

©2021 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.

My Coney Island Baby by Billy O'Callaghan

Books, for Caitlin, had never been anything less than a kind of sorcery. As a child she was constantly armed, and even by her late pre-teens she'd become so voracious a reader that the twice-weekly visits to her local library could barely sate her hunger. More than just educating her, books offered release and freedom in every direction. Desert islands and deepest space became as real as the Brooklyn streets; she learned of headless horsemen and river rafting, Victorian-era London and dogs that would trek across continents to find their masters, and she got to know peg-legged pirates, pipe-smoking detectives and cowboys who drank and brawled but who loved their horses more than their women and who prized honor above all else. 

~p. 91 of Advance Reader Copy, My Coney Island Baby (some changes may have been made to the final print version)

You can guess why I chose that particular passage to share with other booklovers. In My Coney Island Baby by Billy O'Callaghan, Michael and Caitlin have been meeting once a month at Coney Island for decades, sharing their deepest thoughts and intimacy in a way neither can with their respective spouses. But, now things are changing. Will this afternoon in Coney Island be their last or will they finally decide to run away together?

Of course, My Coney Island Baby is not just about that specific afternoon. Instead, as the couple walk to their hotel in the biting winter cold, warm up over coffee, and then climb into bed, their story unfolds. You get to know not only how they met and became lovers but how they met their spouses and the crushing pain that shattered Michael's and his wife's joy, the slow deterioration of warmth in Caitlin's marriage.

I'm not normally a fan of books about marriage or infidelity (or both) and tend to prefer a plot-driven book over one that's character-driven, but Billy O'Callaghan is the friend of a friend and I've wanted to read something by him for a while. I just hadn't gotten around to hunting down anything when My Coney Island Baby became available for review. I didn't enjoy the details of the sex scenes, where they're waxing on about how love makes a freckle on the shoulder special or whatever (not my thing, in general) but I found O'Callaghan's writing poetic and I thought he did an excellent job of balancing the past and present so that by the end of the book I cared about the two people enough to be invested in the decision they had to make about whether or not they'd end up together.

Recommended but not a favorite - Particularly recommended to readers who enjoy a character-driven novel and don't mind a slightly melancholy tone. A story of love and longing, marriage and infidelity, joy and grief, My Coney Island Baby was never going to be a favorite because it has elements I dislike. So, I was surprised at how gripping I found it. It ended up being a 4-star book (out of 5) because of the beauty of the prose, the magnetic pull of the central question, the depth of emotion, the moments of wisdom or acute observation:

In your forties your sense of longing shifts, and pleases itself in comfort rather than thrills. 

I'll definitely be looking for more by Billy O'Callaghan. My thanks to HarperCollins for the review copy.

Oops, forgot to mention the reason Fiona Friday ended up on Thursday! Well, obviously I mixed up the days of the week but I also had to hurriedly post because I knew storms were coming and that line of storms was a doozy. You may have seen an image of two flipped cars on the news (I watched the CBS evening news and saw it), last night. That was from our local Walmart. Because the storms lasted quite a while, once I unplugged the computer I just left it that way and spent my evening reading. Today, it's raining but I can see a wedge of blue sky and I'm very much looking forward to it pushing the latest clouds away. My yard is a lake. Ready to dry out, here. Happy Good Friday to those who celebrate Easter!


©2019 Nancy Horner. All rights reserved. If you are reading this post at a site other than Bookfoolery or its RSS feed, you are reading a stolen feed. Email bookfoolery@gmail.com for written permission to reproduce text or photos.