This Side of Brightness - Hardcover

McCann, Colum

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0805054529 ISBN 13: 9780805054521

Publisher: Metropolitan Books, 1998

Synopsis

Described as "New York's most visible up-and-coming Irish writer" by The New York Times, the author of Songdogs tells the story of a group of tunnel diggers struggling to survive in New York. 35,000 first printing. Tour.

About this title

Review:

This Side of Brightness weaves historical fact with fictional truth, creating a remarkable tale of death, racism, homelessness--and yes, love--spanning four generations. Two characters dominate Colum McCann's narrative: Treefrog (born Clarence Nathan Walker), a homeless man with a dark and shameful secret, and his grandfather Nathan Walker, a black man who came north in the early years of the century to work as a "sandhog", digging the subway tunnels beneath Manhattan. Tunnelling is perhaps the most dangerous occupation a man could have; in the close, dark and dangerous pits far beneath the city streets, differences such as colour or ethnic background cease to matter and Walker soon becomes friends with his crewmates: two Irishmen and an Italian. Then an explosion in one of the tunnels literally blows Walker and three other men up through the earth and into the East River. Walker survives but his best friend Con O'Leary is never found. Leary leaves behind a wife and young daughter whom Walker marries many years later. Walker's tale is told in alternating chapters with Treefrog's, who, like his grandfather, chose a hazardous profession--this one high up in the bright sunlight--as a construction worker building skyscrapers. But madness has brought Treefrog out of the light and back to the tunnels his grandfather helped dig as he scrapes out a meagre existence among the drug addicts, alcoholics, prostitutes and petty criminals that make up the homeless community. But the grimness of McCann's tale is leavened by the beauty of his prose and the intimations all through the book that, even on this side of darkness, redemption is possible. Guy Smit

Review:

'Vivid, potent, beautifully measured, and sustained by astonishingly deft description.' (The Independent on Sunday)

'A dazzling blend of menace and heartbreak.' (The New York Times Book Review)

'It is, perhaps, the first authentic novel about [homelessness], about living below and beyond this rich city. He evokes so powerfully the stink of the present, the poignancy of the past.' (Frank McCourt)

'A tour de-force social history of modern New York, exploring the labyrinthine netherworld of disused subway tunnels, from their creation by Irish migrant workers to their occupation by down-and-outs.' (The Irish Independent)

About this edition

• Publisher: Metropolitan Books
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0805054529
• ISBN 13: 9780805054521
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 289