Items related to Smile: Roddy Doyle
A Guardian / Irish Times Book of the Year
Smile has all the features for which Roddy Doyle has become famous: the razor-sharp dialogue, the humour, the superb evocation of childhood – but this is a novel unlike any he has written before. When you finish the last page you will have been challenged to re-evaluate everything you think you remember so clearly.
Just moved in to a new apartment, alone for the first time in years, Victor Forde goes every evening to Donnelly’s pub for a pint, a slow one.
One evening his drink is interrupted. A man in shorts and pink shirt brings over his pint and sits down. He seems to know Victor’s name and to remember him from school. Says his name is Fitzpatrick.
Victor dislikes him on sight, dislikes too the memories that Fitzpatrick stirs up of five years being taught by the Christian Brothers.
He prompts other memories too – of Rachel, his beautiful wife who became a celebrity, and of Victor’s own small claim to fame, as the man who says the unsayable on the radio.
But it’s the memories of school, and of one particular Brother, that he cannot control and which eventually threaten to destroy his sanity.
Smile has all the features for which Roddy Doyle has become famous: the razor-sharp dialogue, the humour, the superb evocation of childhood – but this is a novel unlike any he has written before. When you finish the last page you will have been challenged to re-evaluate everything you think you remember so clearly.
Just moved in to a new apartment, alone for the first time in years, Victor Forde goes every evening to Donnelly’s pub for a pint, a slow one.
One evening his drink is interrupted. A man in shorts and pink shirt brings over his pint and sits down. He seems to know Victor’s name and to remember him from school. Says his name is Fitzpatrick.
Victor dislikes him on sight, dislikes too the memories that Fitzpatrick stirs up of five years being taught by the Christian Brothers.
He prompts other memories too – of Rachel, his beautiful wife who became a celebrity, and of Victor’s own small claim to fame, as the man who says the unsayable on the radio.
But it’s the memories of school, and of one particular Brother, that he cannot control and which eventually threaten to destroy his sanity.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
Review:
"Roddy Doyle excelled himself... A typically bittersweet novella about a middle-aged man’s memories of his schooldays which pulls the rug shockingly from under the reader’s feet." (Justine Jordan Guardian, Books of the Year)
"A book that made me feel I really was in the presence of a master." (Sebastian Barry Observer)
"Reading Smile, one is swept along – as in all Doyle’s novels – by the vibrancy of the language, the vivid sense of character and place, but nothing prepares you for the final few pages where, in a twist of imaginative brilliance, everything you have read is turned completely on its head... Smile is beautifully written, and beautifully observed" (Mick Brown Daily Telegraph)
"Terribly moving and even, at times, distressing, while saving its greatest surprise until the end... There is a brave and complex ending to the novel... It will inspire debate but also admiration for the courage of a hugely successful writer who refuses to be predictable and uses the novel to challenge both the reader’s sense of ease and the nature of the form itself." (John Boyne Guardian)
"Smile turns out to be a novel of literary deception and self-deception, of suppression, guilt, fantasy and the deep damage that leaves a mind profoundly disordered... I suspect Smile will become a bestseller" (Linda Grant Daily Telegraph)
"Dramatically pulls the rug from under the reader with a final image not just of one damaged man, but of an impotent country poisoned to the core by a history that it cannot shake off. It left me with goosebumps and, a week on, a sour, sad taste still in my mouth." (Claire Allfree Daily Mail)
"The cocktail of dark subject matter and colloquial, humorous dialogue is quintessential Doyle, and this engrossing tale, shot through with pathos, sees him back to his best." (Max Davidson Mail on Sunday)
"His command of voice is absolutely sure, his dialogue authentic and the Ireland his characters inhabit ― still a patchwork of fifties pietism and noughties cosmopolitanism ― completely available to his and the reader’s understanding... An absorbing and expertly told story." (Sam Leith Financial Times)
"Doyle is one of the best writers of dialogue we have, using it with humour and drama." (Luke Brown New Statesman)
"His novels fizz with demotic zing, comic phrasing and the back-and-forth of Irish chat." (Robbie Millen The Times)
Book Description:
"A book that made me feel I really was in the presence of a master." (Sebastian Barry Observer)
"Reading Smile, one is swept along – as in all Doyle’s novels – by the vibrancy of the language, the vivid sense of character and place, but nothing prepares you for the final few pages where, in a twist of imaginative brilliance, everything you have read is turned completely on its head... Smile is beautifully written, and beautifully observed" (Mick Brown Daily Telegraph)
"Terribly moving and even, at times, distressing, while saving its greatest surprise until the end... There is a brave and complex ending to the novel... It will inspire debate but also admiration for the courage of a hugely successful writer who refuses to be predictable and uses the novel to challenge both the reader’s sense of ease and the nature of the form itself." (John Boyne Guardian)
"Smile turns out to be a novel of literary deception and self-deception, of suppression, guilt, fantasy and the deep damage that leaves a mind profoundly disordered... I suspect Smile will become a bestseller" (Linda Grant Daily Telegraph)
"Dramatically pulls the rug from under the reader with a final image not just of one damaged man, but of an impotent country poisoned to the core by a history that it cannot shake off. It left me with goosebumps and, a week on, a sour, sad taste still in my mouth." (Claire Allfree Daily Mail)
"The cocktail of dark subject matter and colloquial, humorous dialogue is quintessential Doyle, and this engrossing tale, shot through with pathos, sees him back to his best." (Max Davidson Mail on Sunday)
"His command of voice is absolutely sure, his dialogue authentic and the Ireland his characters inhabit ― still a patchwork of fifties pietism and noughties cosmopolitanism ― completely available to his and the reader’s understanding... An absorbing and expertly told story." (Sam Leith Financial Times)
"Doyle is one of the best writers of dialogue we have, using it with humour and drama." (Luke Brown New Statesman)
"His novels fizz with demotic zing, comic phrasing and the back-and-forth of Irish chat." (Robbie Millen The Times)
A Guardian / Irish Times Book of the Year
A great novel makes you question everything. Smile is the captivating new book from the winner of the Man Booker Prize for Fiction.
A great novel makes you question everything. Smile is the captivating new book from the winner of the Man Booker Prize for Fiction.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
- PublisherJonathan Cape
- Publication date2017
- ISBN 10 1911214756
- ISBN 13 9781911214755
- BindingHardcover
- Edition number1
- Number of pages224
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Smile [1st PRINT/SIGNED]
Published by
Jonathan Cape
(2017)
ISBN 10: 1911214756
ISBN 13: 9781911214755
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Book Description Hardcover. Condition: New. Dust Jacket Condition: New. 1st Edition. Jonathan Cape, 2017, London. Hard Cover. Book Condition: New. Dust Jacket Condition: New. Stated "First published in the United Kingdom by Jonathan Cape in 2017", first printing with a full number line starting at "1". 8-3/4" tall, 213 numbered pages followed by an unnumbered last page of text; one-piece black cloth binding, gilt lettering on spine; front board is plain; plain cardinal red end pages; fore edge is trimmed. Book is new and nearly pristine: it is square, binding quite clean, hinges tight, corners not bumped, no dings on edges, head of spine lightly dinged. The interior is pristine: it is perfectly clean and free of writing (other than the author's signature), stray marks, stains or discolorations of any sort or paper damage of any type; paper is very lightly toned, very flexible and not at all brittle. Jacket is clean; no tears, folds or fading; no scrapes or scratches; very slight crease at head of spine; raised letters of author's name and title on front panel evident (they have not been crushed); publisher's original price of "£14.99" listed on the lower right corner of front flap; small (3/4" x 11/16") black-on-white store sticker "(240817 / £18.70)" on lower left corner of rear panel. Condition of book and jacket consistent with being brand new and not read. No other discernible or objectionable faults on book or jacket such as marks or writing within, stains, tears, chips, or other damage that would diminish its appearance. No remainder mark, no previous owner markings or inscriptions, not price clipped, not a book club edition, not a former library book. Signed by the author in thin black felt pen in the middle of the title page. Signed by Author(s). Seller Inventory # BMR-2021-2-25-6
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Smile
Published by
Jonathan Cape, London
(2017)
ISBN 10: 1911214756
ISBN 13: 9781911214755
New
Hardcover
First Edition
Signed
Quantity: 1
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Rating
Book Description Hardcover. Condition: New. Dust Jacket Condition: New. First Edition. A fine unread 1st impression in a fine dustwrapper. Signed and dated [7/10/17] by the Author on the title page. Signed at the Cheltenham Literature Festival. Signed by Author(s). Seller Inventory # 008088
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