Easter Rising: A Memoir of Roots and Rebellion

Easter Rising: A Memoir of Roots and Rebellion Review

If you've read "ALL SOULS" you need to read this book too. Also, if you ever have a chance to attend a reading by Michael, GO!!!
This description was was done by the publisher...
MacDonald's first book told of the loss of the author's four siblings to the violence, poverty, and gangsterism of Boston's Irish-American ghetto. The question "How did you get out?" has haunted him ever since. This narrative of reinvention begins with the young MacDonald's first forays outside the soul-crushing walls of Southie's Old Colony housing project. In greater Boston and eventually New York's East Village, he becomes part of the club scene, providing a 1980s social history and a powerful glimpse of what punk music was for him: a lifesaving form of subversion and self-education. Yet family tragedies eventually draw him home again, to a devastating breakdown induced by trauma and guilt. He meets his father for the first time, as a corpse. Finally, two trips to Ireland, the first as an alienated young man, the second with his extraordinary "Ma," are healing journeys unlike any other in Irish-American literature.

Easter Rising: A Memoir of Roots and Rebellion Feature

• ISBN13: 9780618918638
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.

Easter Rising: A Memoir of Roots and Rebellion Overview

In All Souls, Michael Patrick MacDonald told the story of the loss of four of his siblings to the violence, poverty, and gangsterism of Irish South Boston. In Easter Rising he tells the story of how he got out. Desperate to avoid the “normal” life of Southie, Michael reinvents himself in the burgeoning punk rock movement and the thrilling vortex of Johnny Rotten, Mission of Burma, and the Clash.

At nineteen MacDonald escapes further, to Paris and then London. Out of money, he contacts his Irish immigrant grandfather -- who offers a loan, but only if Michael will visit Ireland. It is this reluctant journey “home” that offers MacDonald a chance at reconciliation -- with his heritage, his neighborhood, and his family -- and a way forward.

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