Get ready for novelist Alice McDermott's Commonweal Lecture "The Catholic Writer and the Madness of Art" on Wednesday, April 8 at 8:00 pm in Dolan School of Business by reading one of her novels.
McDermott's most famous work is Charming Billy (1998) — winner of the National Book Award. Charming Billy explores Irish American culture and what happens to those who break away. Rand Richards Cooper from Commonweal writes, "The grand struggle to wrest one's self from the group delivers her protagonists to this deeply American paradox; that getting a life of your own brings a diminished sense of who you are."