Rating: 
Summary: Tired barstool tales retold to capitalize on Frank's success
Review: I agree that M. McCourt's book should not be compared with Angela's Ashes. One is a heartfelt and beautifully written childhood memoir; the other is a hodgepodge of apochryphal stories, much embellished over the years, put down on paper to make a fast buck. I am not surprised by M. McCourt's desire to do this. The praise lavished on the book's style and language by people who should know better is a surprise. I find the book thin,self involved and above all intensely repetitive. Change the names, change the location,add the usual diatribe about the Brits and you've completed another chapter. This was easy money for Malachy McCourt. Thank heaven mine was a borrowed copy. I own Angela's Ashes, book and unabridged on tape. But then as we have all agreed the two books should not be compared!
Rating: 
Summary: A Loser's Lament
Review: As some recent reviews mention, I don't think McCourt is truly proud of his past. But he clearly is not too proud to immerse his readers in the graphic details of his drunken, selfish days. (Which the dust jacket assures us are over and that he is happily married.) Honest? About as honest as a typical guest on Jerry Springer and just as eager to shock. I detect more than a pinch of blarney (B.S.) in these twice told tales. Funny? I never even snickered at his tiresome exploits. Perhaps McCourt's is funnier in person. What's left is a long, boring litany of self-pity, selfishness and exaggeration. Happily married? Let's ask his second wife.
Rating:
Summary: Can't believe they are brothers...
Review: I was so eager to read A MONK SWIMMING after finishing brother Frank's ANGELA'S ASHES...I wanted to know what happenned to the McCourt brothers after their arrival in N.Y. What a disappointment! While Frank becomes a teacher and a Purlitzer Price winner, brother Malachy becomes a self-destructing, womanizing drunk, worse than his father because he knew better! I read Malachy's book because of "Angela's Ashes", and it is hard not to compare them and be disappointed.
Rating: 
Summary: Not a hero's story, but that's not the intent...
Review: Without the benefit of reading Malachy McCourt's brother's book "Angela's Ashes," I had no sibling manuscript to which to compare this book when I read it. I understood Frank McCourt's book was a wonderfully written, tragic account of impoverished life in Limerick, Ireland; realizing his brother's memoir covered a much different story in the States, I had no preconceived expectations of "A Monk Swimming" when I began to read it.Though I did not approve of the author's moral behaviour, I thought his memoir was beautifully and honestly written. I do not think he intends to brag about his philandering and irresponsible behaviour as a young parent, media personality, and self-proclaimed "celebrity bartender"; rather, he seems to reflect upon the follies of his life with a healthy mix of wit and regret - strong regret. Writing frankly and irreverently, he doesn't paint a picture of himself as a hero or a saint, and for that, I admired him all the more as I read this book. Clearly, as a recovered alcoholic now in a stable and happy marriage, he has gone through some kind of catharsis in writing this memoir, which climaxes itself in a catharsis when he confronts the pain of his childhood he had been shelving away for so long. We feel his joy and his agony, as well as his regret, as we read the acutely-written details of his young adulthood in New York, California, Ireland, and eventually across the globe. Excellently written as it is, this is not a book for the patronizing readers looking for a bit of enlightening fluff about a contrived "rite of passage" of a pious Irish immigrant. Rather, it is a true story of a human being encountering moral conflicts - and witnessing them - and sometimes beating them, often losing to them, and always coming to terms honestly with them in quite often less-than-idyllic circumstances. It is a memoir for the eternal wanderers in us all...
Rating:
Summary: fantastic irish humor and wit
Review: Angela's Ashes was a wonderful book, told with a great deal of honesty and pain and I greatly admire Frank McCourt for his courage to rise above it and succeed. Brother Malachy, on the other hand, chose to succeed in a much different way. In no way can he be faulted for he knew no true love and affection as a child and coming to America and becoming acquainted with the artsy culture, he felt welcomed and loved. These men are brothers, true, but as a mother of three very closely born sons, I know that they can each be very different,even though raised in the same way. To those who panned "A Monk Swimming", please remember that this is a different McCourt, writing about an entirely different time in his life. Malachy's story is every bit as important as Frank's, just told differently.
Rating:
Summary: Hey, some of us LIKED it
Review: As a child in "Angela's Ashes," Malachy showed the cleverness, the charisma, that his father no doubt had before he fell into a bucket of stout and never resurfaced. Malachy tells with unflinching honesty the tale of a second-generation alcoholic. Some readers seem to have mistaken his bluntness for pride. To me it was obvious that he was full of shame while telling how he repeated his father's mistakes of denial and abandonment. And just because he calls women "fleshpots" while telling old stories doesn't mean he's a misogynist -- read the dedication. It's foolish to expect a book similar to Frank's. Don't make the mistake of expecting siblings to write in tandem. Anyway, I laughed out loud at some of his outrageous tales of woe. And the rest of the time, I marveled at the fact that he survived at all. It's worth a read if you want to see how hard this wounded soul tried to die or be killed before he finally gave up and stopped running. I still think Malachy is fascinating.
Rating: 
Summary: M. McCourt is not F. McCourt, so don't compare, just read!
Review: C'mon, haven't any of you reviewers ever read P.G. Wodehouse's books? This is a good (not excellent) takeoff on old Plum's style of writing - an Irish version as it were. This is where the comparisons should be made, not with brother Frank McCourt's style. Frank is subtle and graceful, Malachy is heavy-handed and raucous. If the reader has a brother or sister, he will recognoze immediately that no two siblings view the family in the same way. The point is, BOTH VIEWS ARE VALID.
Rating: 
Summary: Lively tales spun together by a first rate storyteller.
Review: Malachy McCourt picks up where his childhood left off in his brother Frank's memoir, "Angela's Ashes". McCourt is an excellent writer in his own right and tells the tales of his alcoholic young adulthood with humor, sadness, and a great love of the English language. An excellent read, much more than a lark.
Rating:
Summary: Obviously a lot of reders don't get it
Review: OK, OK, yes this is a first-person story of a womanizing drunk. No, the events related therein are not much to be proud of. Malachy is not, however, bragging about his excesses. This is his account of events and his thoughts as they happened. He leaves the obvious judgmental conclusion to the reader. Malachy is fully aware of the nature and quality of his acts. All he has left out is a statement that he did morally bad things, but only the more literal folks would need that. The reader has to take the story seriously, but understand the tone is self-deprecating. May I suggest you read Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal. That might give you an idea of how a writer can say something without literally meaning it.
Rating:
Summary: Don't waste your time reading this book.
Review: It is apparant that Malachy McCourt scribbled this book in order to receive some benefits of his brother's fame.
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