Rating: 
Summary: Nat'l Book Award was well deserved.
Review: When I read McDermott's 'At Weddings and Wakes' I was instantly drawn in to a world that seemed familiar. It was a delicious shock to have an author conjure characters that I felt I knew in my own life. So it was with great eagerness that I snapped up 'Charming Billy', and my eagerness was rewarded. I won't detail the storyline,as that has already been done well by other reviewers here. I will add my opinion that McDermott crafts conversations that seem real and something from my memory rather than from a work of fiction (I'm thinking of the restaurant scenes after the funeral). She also creates characters that, for all their imperfections, never fail to reach your heart and mind. McDermott made Billy so clear and real that at several points in the story tears welled in my eyes. The character of Uncle Billy became dear to me, with his heart and his frailties. I didn't want the book to end. For an author to write a book that makes me care so about the characters that the rest of the world must wait until I am finished, is a gift. McDermott has given me this gift twice. The National Book Award Panel served their mandate very well this year.
Rating: 
Summary: A good story but not well-told.
Review: Despite what could have been a cast of deeply romantic characters, McDermott failed to develop them to a level that drew me in. Having heard that the book had won the National Book Award, I forced myself to read on, hoping to be drawn in to the magic of the story. Unfortunately, it turned out to be nothing but an unsatisfying slog.
Rating: 
Summary: Maybe there was something I missed.
Review: I wanted to like this book. I had read the reviews and liked other books Alice McDermott has written. This book seemed to go nowhere. Billy was a drunk with a codependant wife. End of story. I wanted something more to happen when Billy met Eva again in Ireland. I stuck with it to the end but wish I hadn't.
Rating: 
Summary: The book was ok, but not award winning material
Review: I enjoyed the opening chapter, dinner after the funeral, for its insightfullness. The comments about Billy and the widow Meave brought back memories and provided insights about thier lives.However, I quickly got lost.
Rating:
Summary: evocative prose within a confusing structure
Review: While there is some beautiful writing in this book - especially the sections when Billy and Dennis spent a summer in the Hamptons and Billy first met Eva, the love of his life, I don't think this book deserves the accolades it has received. My main reason for saying this is that it is unclear who the narrator is and it is not clear where she has gotten her information. The relationships in this book are touching and heartfelt, yet it veers off at times and it's difficult to tell who is being addressed and whether the narrator is present or not. She is not James Joyce or Virginia Woolf so these things are not stylistic, but are annoyances in the midst of some beautiful writing and an affecting story. The descriptions of the Hamptons in the 1940s are charming and wondrous in light of how glitzy it has become today. Read this book, but prepare yourself for a bit of confusion.
Rating: 
Summary: Irish-American drinks himself to death (how surprising).
Review: The story does not exactly break new ground, but it's well-written, rings true, and makes for a compelling read. Readers will recognize the familiar terrain, as most families have a "Billy" of their own. I just wish the reviewers wouldn't give away so much of the plot in their reviews.
Rating:
Summary: disappointingly over-rated
Review: Well, I finished it. The reviewers say that this novel cannot be relegated to plot. That's for sure, I found it hard to follow and boring. The reviewers say the emotional content is restrained, subtle. I say that with a couple of notable exceptions, the emotional content is numbing. Imo, the only redeeming features of this book are the finely drawn characters and the realistic portrayal of the tedium of daily life. (No wonder it was boring.) I think that this novel would have made a terrific short story. I'm sorry I didn't get to read it in "The New Yorker."
Rating:
Summary: Quiet, lyrical prose
Review: I have always loved Alice McDermott's books and am glad to see her finally get the recognition she deserves. I agree with some readers who say it was difficult to keep track of the characters - but it was like joining a large family, as an outsider, and gradually figuring out who is who. By the end of the book I knew them all quite well and, reluctant to leave this family, I started from the beginning again. Then the bookwas even more wonderful because I felt like a family member participating in the re-hash of an old family legend. The portion of the book where Billy first meets Eva is gorgeous. She is a governess for some young children - it is the summer - on the beach. The babies are hot and sticky and hungry and Billy takes up the littlest one in his arms. "But the child was light as a feather in his hands and the lightness took his breath away. The baby wore a seersucker sunsuit that left his tiny arms and shoulders bare and Billy covered these with a cupped palm as he rested the child against his chest. The flesh was as sweetly warm as if the hand of God had just formed it. He blew softly across the child's downy hair and closed his eyes to say, "Now, now, little fellow. Now now."" This paragraph is typical of the lyrical prose in this book and the incredible way McDermott paints word pictures that not only provide beautiful descriptions, but also evoke deep emotion in the reader. A well deserved prize for a deserving author.
Rating:
Summary: Charming Billy was positiviely negative
Review: I was a lit major and an alcholic (recovering), and I checked out Charming Billy from my local library with great expectations. I first heard of the book when NBC interviewed Alice McDermott and I learned of a plot that I thought I could relate to. My life story also involves the loss of a loved one many years ago. About a quarter of the way into the book, I began to get edgy because of the rapid fire dialogue, the seemingly endless parenthetical information such as "she said, lifting her eyebrows in indignation, and the plot structure left me cold. This book seems like so many other modern novels that fail to develop enough character so that the reader can develop a relationship with them. Both Billy's family and friends and Billy himself are portrayed so sketchily that I failed to feel any bond for any of them. Consequently, Billy's love loss and battle with alcholism (from which he dies) feels like just another statistic I read in the newspaper. By contrast, stories by the late R. F. Delderfield, especially his short novel, Diana, are so well drawn and the characters are so fully sketched that I develop a personal interest in them. In consequence, what they go through and learn translates into a real experience for me. I suggest that authors like McDermott go back and revisit books that tell stories without the cute TV-inspired structures and superfluous and distracting asides that do nothing to advance the story.
Rating:
Summary: Poetry in Prose
Review: A marvelous evocation of a special time and place. The author's eye for detail, and ear for the subtle nuances of human relationships are awesome. Life, love,( of God and Man ) are examined through the sensibilities of an extended, working class, Irish-American family. I,too, think that a diagramatic family tree ( see War and Peace ) would have been helpful in the early chapters of the book. I am reading another of her books as I write. Alice McDermott is a real talent.
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