"When I was a young lad twenty or thirty or forty years ago I lived in a small town where they were all after me on account of what I done on ...
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reviews
Jul 12, 2008
Spudsie
rated it: 
Typically I try to record how a book leaves me feeling, any lessons I may have learned from it or even my overall mood when I’m finished. This may turn out to be my shortest commentary to date.
Confusion.
Yup. I feel so lost. Confused. Puzzled. ?????
When I read books I want the story and characters to unfold and reveal themselves to me as the author intended. To that end I try not to read any reviews or commentaries about a book right before I start it. W More...
Confusion.
Yup. I feel so lost. Confused. Puzzled. ?????
When I read books I want the story and characters to unfold and reveal themselves to me as the author intended. To that end I try not to read any reviews or commentaries about a book right before I start it. W More...
May 29, 2007
adam
rated it: 
This novel has several things going for it: a style that is both unique and engaging; a narrator that is as charmingly funny as he is frightening, and a beginning that hooks you immediately.
However, in spite of these things, I'm still not sure if I like this novel on the whole. Although Francie's style of narration is engaging at first, it starts to get on the nerves by the middle of the book. While this might be part of the point of the novel, it nevertheless ends up coming off as More...
However, in spite of these things, I'm still not sure if I like this novel on the whole. Although Francie's style of narration is engaging at first, it starts to get on the nerves by the middle of the book. While this might be part of the point of the novel, it nevertheless ends up coming off as More...
Jul 24, 2011
K.
rated it: 
Chilling.
One of the best books I've ever had to read for school.
The diction takes some getting used to as there are no punctuations, save for the ever essential period. It takes stream-of-consciousness to a whole other level. You're never quite sure if its Francie thinking, Francie speaking, Francie recalling a memory and don't even get me started on actual conversations. You'll have to navigate your own way between who's saying what. I make it sound like its a difficul More...
One of the best books I've ever had to read for school.
The diction takes some getting used to as there are no punctuations, save for the ever essential period. It takes stream-of-consciousness to a whole other level. You're never quite sure if its Francie thinking, Francie speaking, Francie recalling a memory and don't even get me started on actual conversations. You'll have to navigate your own way between who's saying what. I make it sound like its a difficul More...
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May 29, 2009
Clodagh
rated it:
The Butcher Boy is one of those amazing books that you hope won't end. I read other reviews in which people said that it is depressing, and yes it is if you look at the plot outline of a mentally disturbed boy who doesn't have the best of luck. However there is a lot of dark humour in it that has you giggling despite yourself. The plot is dark, there are some very disturbing issues like Paedophilia, suicide etc... but by showing it through the eyes of a mad boy these topics are not touched in
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Mar 16, 2011
Morgan
rated it: 
Plot reviews and synopsis details abound through the various five star reviews. If you want a breakdown about what the book is about, then check there first. Instead I will cut to the chase and try to offer you a glimpse into what you may or may not like about the novel.
First off, this is a 'stream of conscious' type of book that places you right into the mind of a teenager in Ireland (though in truth it is really the narrator as an old man looking back to "when [he] was a young More...
First off, this is a 'stream of conscious' type of book that places you right into the mind of a teenager in Ireland (though in truth it is really the narrator as an old man looking back to "when [he] was a young More...
Apr 11, 2010
El
rated it:
There are certain books I've read that are so intense that they have left an indelible print on me, despite what I've thought of the book overall. Over the years that list has grown and include Jerzy Kosinksi's The Painted Bird, Bret Easton Ellis's American Psycho, Iain Banks's The Wasp Factory, and Anthony Burgess's A Clockwork Orange. I can now add Patrick McCabe's The Butcher Boy to that list.
This first-person stream-of-consciousness narrative takes some getting used to. Franci More...
This first-person stream-of-consciousness narrative takes some getting used to. Franci More...
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May 26, 2009
Fabian
rated it:
Previously with "Breakfast on Pluto" I got the "feel" of this Irish writer. He loves his readers to fully embody his fully-realized protagonist; one enjoys the rational irrationalities that litter a wartorn broken psyche of Francie, a pauper who is taken in by the community only to be persecuted for a hideous crime. Think of an Irish Charley from "Flowers for Algernon."
Think too of "A Clockwork Orange." The ultraviolence and a masterful, inven More...
Think too of "A Clockwork Orange." The ultraviolence and a masterful, inven More...
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Aug 09, 2011
Kasandra
rated it:
I've never read anything so simultaneously awful and sad and disgusting while still being riotously funny. This was fantastic, the voice is spot-on realistic and twisted, yet logical in its way, boyish and naive but unintentionally observant at the same time. Just a perfect balance. I never felt like the author was poking himself into the story or showing himself, the writing stays in character throughout. This put me into another world. Throughout the story, reality intertwines with episodes th
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Aug 17, 2010
Aaron
rated it:
The Butcher Boy is one of my favorite films and I just recently discovered it was a book first (go figure). I remember seeing the movie when it was first released and thinking "WTF" through most of it, which meant I was thoroughly enjoying it of course. It ranks up there with The Piano Teacher & Jacob's Ladder, though the closest thing plot wise I can think of would be Heavely Creatures.
It's weird to say this, but the novel stayed true to my memories of the film. I could More...
It's weird to say this, but the novel stayed true to my memories of the film. I could More...
Aug 10, 2011
LOVE it. Id kept coming across the word 'disturbing' in the description of this book, and while there were a couple of moments, I felt that it constantly kept going back to the humourous. I had a lot of good laughs while reading this book despite the seriousness of the themes and all the awful events that happen to our protagonist.
It kind of serves as a lesson to how harmful it is to be judgemental, but you do also see the unfortunate way the mind of Francie Brady sees or makes sense of whats h More...
It kind of serves as a lesson to how harmful it is to be judgemental, but you do also see the unfortunate way the mind of Francie Brady sees or makes sense of whats h More...
Sep 23, 2011
Jerry
rated it:
There is a little bit of Francie Brady in all of us, we are all influenced by traumatic events in our childhood. This is a brilliant book, and the characters are well observed real people. This book is saturated in the language and collective idiosyncrasies of the Irish. This is 1970s rural Ireland of the Industrial schools. I knew before I read the book to expect black humour and a tragic ending, but I was captivated by the story, and events, as they slowly spiralled downwards and downwards tow
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Oct 13, 2011
Jen
rated it: 
Violent books don't necessarily scare me away from reading their content, unless it is so graphic that the images will stay in my mind for a long while after having read them. Husband warned me that "The Butcher Boy" was extremely violent and disturbing, and I might be better not having read it. Approximately forty-five pages into the story, the author's style of writing for Francie's narrative, e.g. lower-case run-on sentences without proper punctuation, bothered me more than the upco
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Apr 05, 2011
Daryl
rated it:
Not sure if I would've liked this novel more or less if I hadn't seen the movie version first. That movie (which I rather enjoyed) made me want to read the book. The characters in the movie -- and the voiceover narration -- speak in such strong Irish accents that it's difficult at times to understand them. I thought the book might be easier to follow. It was, although the author's disregard for grammar and punctuation forces one to concentrate, while at the same time, it reveals the character of
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Mar 09, 2010
Michelle
rated it:
I'm not sure "liked it" is really the appropriate description for how I felt about this book, but since it was better than the book I finished just before this one (The Time Traveler's Wife), it seemed like it deserved a different rating.
I'm actually surprised that any critic would describe this book as "hilarious" but that's what was stamped across the cover. Disturbing, interesting, and even confusing, definitely, but never hilarious.
Although the author More...
I'm actually surprised that any critic would describe this book as "hilarious" but that's what was stamped across the cover. Disturbing, interesting, and even confusing, definitely, but never hilarious.
Although the author More...
Mar 03, 2010
James
rated it:
Well this book definitely had its moments of greatness and moments of abject failure. Saying that I have to comment that I did enjoy this book more than I thought I would. I was able to devour it in a day and a half and it left me with things to ponder.
We see life in a small Irish town through the eyes of a very lonely and completely deranged teenage male. We suffer his horrid life and his complete fixation on his one friend. At times this book is heartbreaking in its sadness and fu More...
We see life in a small Irish town through the eyes of a very lonely and completely deranged teenage male. We suffer his horrid life and his complete fixation on his one friend. At times this book is heartbreaking in its sadness and fu More...
Aug 14, 2010
Joel
rated it:
Patrick McCabe seems to have a soft spot for psychotic narrators. "The Butcher Boy" is written in a very natural brogue style that is both charming and terrible as the reader follows Francie Brady through his childhood misadventures. Some critics have compared McCabe's book with Twain's "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" and I think the comparison apt. Not only are they both bildungsroman, but they are comedic and do not hesitate to criticize their respective societies. The
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Sep 28, 2009
emi
rated it:
This haunting novel is about a little boy growing up in 1960's Ireland in a completely dysfunctional household with a suicidal mother and alcoholic father. Written in kind of a psychotic stream of consciousness, Francie's wreckless descent into madness would be unbearable to witness were it not for the hilarity that Patrick McCabe maintains throughout.
I'm curious to know what The Butcher Boy by Colin MacCabe is. Patrick McCabe's version won the 1992 Irish Time Aer Lingus Prize, a More...
I'm curious to know what The Butcher Boy by Colin MacCabe is. Patrick McCabe's version won the 1992 Irish Time Aer Lingus Prize, a More...
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Feb 09, 2009
Jennifer
rated it:
Wow, I FINALLY finished this short novel (a Booker Prize nominee; it was also made into a film). It took me about 2 months, maybe more. My problem was the train of thought writing style. I can not deal with run on sentences. I understand their purpose in this book, as it's about a very lonely, troubled, somewhat insane teenage boy. It makes sense that his thoughts would blur together. However, they made reading it a pain, at least for me. In any case, it's a well-done novel, albeit very depressi
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Mar 23, 2011
Emilia
rated it:
Some thoughts
-Clockwork Orange with a realistic sympathetic narrator (interior monologue in self-made language)
-Flannery O'Connor on acid (biting, grinding devastating social commentary)
-my people? or at least people whose messed-up-ness makes sense to me (paralyzingly melancholy violent Irish)
This book, as one might have been able to tell, was a tough read, because you have to accept being in this heartbroken sociopathic little person's head 100 percent or you will More...
-Clockwork Orange with a realistic sympathetic narrator (interior monologue in self-made language)
-Flannery O'Connor on acid (biting, grinding devastating social commentary)
-my people? or at least people whose messed-up-ness makes sense to me (paralyzingly melancholy violent Irish)
This book, as one might have been able to tell, was a tough read, because you have to accept being in this heartbroken sociopathic little person's head 100 percent or you will More...
Jul 29, 2010
Allison
rated it:
If I had to put this book into a category, I would classify it with Bret Easton Ellis' American Psycho, only less elegantly written.
The novel starts out fairly easily, engaging the reader with promises of a dysfunctional family and schoolboy rivalries, all while the reader grows accustomed to choppy first-person style of narration. (The novel is told by the main character, an Irish schoolboy named Francie.) Gradually, suspense builds as the reader's suspicions are aroused by the odd trea
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Jul 29, 2008
Paul
rated it:
Absolutely phenomenal. This is a must-read for anyone with a heart who can stand a bit of the old ultraviolence. It would be terribly reductive to describe this novel as a mashup of The Catcher in the Rye and A Clockwork Orange, so I won't describe it as such, but its narrator definitely has that Holdenesque naivete and charm to him, and the language, while not as inventive as Burgess', is still a lot of fun. I kept telling people about the book as I was reading it and my descriptions all sounde
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May 27, 2008
César
rated it:
I saw Neil Jordan's adaptation of The Butcher Boy a few years ago, and as I've finally got myself to read the novel, I marveled at how Jordan visually captured the narrative. Patrick McCabe's book, unlike the film, comes off (to me)as more of a character study than a story.
We see, rather read, of Francie and how he grows up. We follow him as he tells us about his family, his mother's suicide, his alcoholic father, and his overwhelming hatred for his neighbor, Ms. Nugent. Through it More...
We see, rather read, of Francie and how he grows up. We follow him as he tells us about his family, his mother's suicide, his alcoholic father, and his overwhelming hatred for his neighbor, Ms. Nugent. Through it More...
Mar 25, 2011
Paul
rated it:
I've finished Butcher Boy. Most books that I find frustrating in the first half pull it together in the second half and finish strong as the plot reaches its conclusion. This one did not...
spoilers ahead!
The transitions were too abrupt in the first half. The most important event of the first half, his mothers suicide, was spoiled by a horrible transition. In the second half that improved, but the story got harder to follow; between trying to follow the stream of conscio More...
spoilers ahead!
The transitions were too abrupt in the first half. The most important event of the first half, his mothers suicide, was spoiled by a horrible transition. In the second half that improved, but the story got harder to follow; between trying to follow the stream of conscio More...
Jul 31, 2011
A surprising read. I find myself still trying to mull it over. I am not overwhelmed with the book but am not disapointed with it either. If you enjoy a book that makes your jaw drop and the same time as it makes you want to reexamine your grasp on sanity, pick up The Butcher Boy. At the same time don't shy away just because it might frighten you, it might just need a couple days to stew. All totalled it is a book that needs some serious thought an fortitude to get through it.
Jun 29, 2008
Emily
rated it:
This is a brillant novel that reads a bit like an Irish version of the Catcher in the Rye, with a younger, less privelaged Holden narrating his rites of passage and precocious observations of the world around him.
Unlike Salinger's classic, The Butcher Boy takes an irrevocable turn for the worse at the end, forcing the reader to examine the importance of family and their influences during childhood. I felt like this story could be universal in a way, a discouraging yet important fa More...
Unlike Salinger's classic, The Butcher Boy takes an irrevocable turn for the worse at the end, forcing the reader to examine the importance of family and their influences during childhood. I felt like this story could be universal in a way, a discouraging yet important fa More...
Feb 15, 2008
Mairi
rated it:
The story follows Francie Brady through the loss of his childhood and his descent into madness. Lots of stream-of-consciousness. Lots of crazy. Still readable and beautiful and sad. One of my favorites. This is one of those books that I loan out and never get back. I think the last copy that went on walkabout was number five. Tell you anything?
Upon latest re-read: Huh. Patrick McCabe does the same thing with dialogue that drove me crazy in Jose Saramago's Blindness--no quotes, in-lin More...
Upon latest re-read: Huh. Patrick McCabe does the same thing with dialogue that drove me crazy in Jose Saramago's Blindness--no quotes, in-lin More...
Feb 01, 2010
Becky
rated it:
The Butcher Boy is the dark tale of a young boy from Ireland who loses his family and friends with dark consequences. It starts a little bit Curious Tale of the Dog in the Nighttime and after some light relief ends a little bit American Psycho. McCabe makes a valiant effort to enter the psyche of a boy who received a bit of a duff hand from life, but despite this, I wasn't completely drawn in.
Sep 22, 2008
Lee
rated it:
One of the saddest, and most compelling stories I have read as of late. Patrick McCabe is quite an author, his writing style makes it easy to get through a book in one day, and the tales that he does tell are gripping. I felt so lost as I learned more and more about Francie, I wish I could have been in the book with him. Telling him everything was okay, that I "wouldn't let him down" like all the rest. That, of course it wasn't and couldn't be his fault about his mother. And that yes,
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Dec 10, 2008
Carol
rated it:
Well-written story of a young psychopath's mental turning point and subsequent downward spiral. Kind of like a much darker Catcher in the Rye, it's told from the very flawed narrator's POV and so you feel a bit like an accomplice. I never really got swept up in this book, but it's a good, fast (and fairly disturbing) read.
Feb 20, 2010
Carol
rated it:
A fantastic story that grabbed me at the beginning and held on until the end. The story takes place in a small village in Ireland circa the early 1960s. A young teenaged boy, Francie, with a suicidal mother, and an alcoholic father, in desperate need of love and attention starts his decent into madness when his best friend, Joe, matures and leaves Francie behind. An absolute spellbinder.
