Maeve Binchy is like the Irish Fannie Flagg. Does that make any sense? She creates these great characters and they keep showing up in all her novels. They are all 'stand alone' stories. The characters just intersect quite a bit.
This book is about a sweet couple with a pitiful son. The son, Noel, has a dead end job and enjoys a pint more than most Irishmen...which is a lot. Cousin Emily arrives from America and sends the whole family plus the entire neighborhood into a tizzy. (It's a Maeve Binchy tizzy so it's much calmer than an American tizzy.) About the time Emily arrives, Noel finds out he is going to be a father. The mother of his baby has a terminal illness so Noel is going to be a single father. Emily mobilizes the entire community to help with baby Frankie. Noel goes back to school, starts going to AA and generally does very well.
There are no deep themes in this book. It's just a few hundred pages of joy. You meet these goofy characters and you like them all. Even the mean social worker is impossible to hate.
If Maeve Binchy lives long enough, I know she's going to write a book about Frankie as a grown up.
Dear God, please let Maeve Binchy live long enough to write that book!
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