This Is Happiness

I don’t have enough words to say how much I loved this book. The language alone is worth the price of the book, and the characters are real people. Every small town had a Dr. Troy with one or more beautiful daughters. There was a Christy in every town, a (perhaps) ne’er -do-well who carried mystery about him. We are all Noe, lost in the process of deciding who to become. Who can resist a book in which chapter one consists of four words: it had stopped raining. The last book I loved this much was House of Broken Angels-language, story, people. Buy this book!

Beautifully written introduction.. that never seemed to end. I gave up after 39 pages. I kept waiting for some kind of story to unfold.

I absolutely loved this book. Whatever I write will never do justice to this writer’s ability to express himself with such beautiful visual sentences. He juxtaposes words and they work so well together. He weaves a wonderful tale that revolves about electricity finally arriving in an Irish hamlet and the reader gets to know families and a man who comes back to this town to apologize for something he did decades ago. I wanted to know how the story ended, but at the same time I wanted to live in the world the story crated. The author’s prior novel The History of Rain was long listed for the Man Booker award in fiction. I will read that and consumer everything else her has written, I was that taken with this author.

The reviews for this book are extremely positive. However, the plot runs so, so slowly as the elegant (and endless) descriptions go on and on about, well, everything. The author's use of serpentine, obtuse, and labyrinthine vocabulary may delight English Lit majors but, for the rest of us, it feels like it slowly plods along.

Set in the rural village of Faha, in County Clare, Ireland, this story wanders a bit as though it is traveling on one of the twisty, winding rural roads of the place where this story begins, and electricity is about to come to the people who live there."It had stopped raining."This story begins with this sentence, a very telling sentence that is even more so as it is the first chapter, this spot in Ireland where rain was "…a condition of living. It came straight-down and sideways, frontwards backward and any other wards God could think of. It came in sweeps, in waves, sometimes in veils. It came dressed as drizzle, as mizzle, as mist, as showers, frequent and widespread, as a wet fog, as a damp day, a drop, a dreeping, and an out-and-out downpour…until in Faha your clothes were rain your skin was rain and your house was rain with a fireplace."The narrator, Noe, Noel Crowe, is seventy-eight years as he tells the story of that time, a time now more than six decades in the past, old enough to view himself as an antique, and "aware that by the mercy of creation the soonest thing to evaporate in memory is hardship and rain." Noe shares his story of his time in Faha, a story of first loves, by more than one Fahaean, of broken hearts and hearts that continue to break, a love of this place, and the people, family and friends - some gone too soon. With a particular fondness for reminiscing of that one memorable spring, Noe shares this story through his memories of this time and place, and the people. The lessons learned, the regrets, the yearning for love lost, a glimpse at life in this "valley where the fields were in love with the river" and life was simpler.Years ago, I was introduced to the writing of Niall Williams when I read his History of the Rain,also located in Faha, and loved it. Since then, I’ve read several of his earlier novels and loved them all. His writing is both lyrical and whimsical, his turns of phrase charming, and the setting so atmospheric and enchanting that I can always envision the place, his characters so memorable and endearing that I miss them, as soon as I leave the pages.

Simply one of the most beautifully written books I have ever read. The sentences are like lyrics of poetry, and the story is one of about a boys coming of age as well as a turning point in a small village’s history. You are fully invested in this small Irish village, feeling both the wonder and ordinary aspects of everyday life, as if you were there yourself.

Niall expresses so beautifully his Zen-like appreciation of the present moment, unfolding around him in relationships and more generally resonating in his lived experience. The retrospective lens of the narrator skilfully allows present, and past as it is experienced in the present, to infuse each other. A literary triumph.

I really felt as if I were in Ireland experiencing the lives and feelings of the main characters, Noe and Christy. The descriptions of countryside and people are lengthy, vivid, and old fashioned, but I found the book restful and touching,

I loved it! The slow pace of the unfolding story reflects the pace of Irish village life at the time. The story is not the central theme of the novel however. It is like a long conversation round a fire, probably in just the glow of the flames, with each speaker contributing his reflections in turn. The writing is sublime. The humour is mischievous and twinkling, poking fun at the great institutions but never being hurtful or disrespectful. The poignancy of the later chapters was rendered beautifully. The characters are all people we could meet anywhere in Ireland at any time. Williams has caught their idioms and speech patterns exactly. I was a child in Ireland at the time of rural electrification and this novel brought back so many memories that I frequently had tears in my eyes. I lived in the town (with electricity) but I had cousins and friends living in the areas about to be electrified. I remember one child’s eyes rounded like saucers as he described “the kettle that boiled on the wire” and witnessed his first taste of ice-cream! This was a great read. Thank you, Niall Williams. O now!

The knowledge of small town Ireland in the 1950's is immense; and the detail of the writing, and the use of language and thought is incredibly real to life. The author's observation and the way he captures it on the page is excellent...at time very funny too.However the real clincher for me is the description of young love/infatuation and its echo into long after. For me, it was (almost) too personal...as though he had seen how I was when I was first in love...that just saying her name out loud, that standing on her street, the sheer bliss of just seeing her for a second only. This is exquisite, I have never read anything of such true raw emotion. Layered onto this is his reflection as an old man, and the older man in the story. I have copied so many paragraphs from this novel into my notebook, and would have copied so many more if I had not needed to keep reading. This is worth far more than 5 stars!!!!

Here we have a novel based around the electrification of rural Clare. The aged narrator tells the story of his youthful experience, as his memory sees it. We meet loveable characters. We acquaint with local customs and traditions. We hear almost lyrical descriptions of the counrtryside. However the storyline is loose and, possibly too long. Perhaps he strives too much to use a complicated or less familiar word or phrase when a simpler one might do the job better.

Having lived in west Clare for 15 years (before moving back to the UK), I felt completely at home reading this book, as it absolutely catches the ethos of the rural Ireland of the nineteen-fifties. The structure of the book is very interesting and constantly hold the attention, and it's use of Irish idiom and culture is really authentic and not some picture postcard view. Highly commended - even if you're not Irish or interested in Ireland, it's a captivating book.

I bought this book after reading the reviews, which were very positive and because I'm second generation Irish.Sadly it did nothing for me at all - boring and tedious.