An ordinary life-its sharp pains and unexpected joys, its bursts of
clarity and moments of confusion-lived by an ordinary, but unforgettable
woman: this is the subject of Someone, Alice McDermott's extraordinary
New York Times bestselling novel.
We first glimpse Marie Commeford as a child: a girl in thick glasses
observing her pre-Depression world from a Brooklyn stoop. Through her
first heartbreak and eventual marriage; her delicate brother's brief
stint as a Catholic priest and his emotional breakdown; her career as a
funeral director's "consoling angel"; the deaths of her parents and the
births of her children-we follow Marie through the changing world of the
twentieth century and her Irish-American enclave. Rendered with
remarkable empathy and insight, Someone is a novel that speaks of life
as it is daily lived, with passion and heartbreak, a crowning
achievement of one of the finest American writers at work today.