All Souls: A Family Story from Southie

The book is interesting for its image of Southie as seen through the eyes of a child growing up there.The story starts out in the early 1970s, roughly 1974. I lived in greater Boston at this time. I moved there for work, excited to move to a college town, in the state that voted for George McGovern. Unfortunately, Boston was not just a college town. I had the wrong accent, and in business there were many Bostonians who treated me as an outsider, not to be trusted. That same distrust of outsiders pervades Southie.The events of the day were very disturbing. Having campaigned for Tom Bradley (first black mayor of Los Angeles) a few years earlier, I was horrified by events in Boston. Louise Day Hicks, people shouting “Bus the n****** back to Africa,” and the stoning of school buses were all beyond my comprehension.Although I witnessed racist parades in my neighborhood on Massachusetts Avenue, I only saw the events in Southie in the news, either the Boston Globe or WBZ. I had two colleagues at work, Joe and Michael, both from Southie, who had advised me not to go there without one of them to escort me. Hearing of the racial conflict in Southie, I envisioned working class whites against black kids, when in fact it was poor whites, many on welfare, resisting integration with black kids of similar or better economic status.Welfare mothers, having more babies by different fathers; unemployed alcoholic men hanging out on the street with a paper bag; dropouts; shoplifting and theft and gangs. That was a stereotype I had heard used to describe life in the ghetto. That same stereotype turns out to describe perfectly the white population of the housing projects in Southie, as described by the author.Early on, I read the smattering of negative reviews. I attributed some of them to being judgmental about the people in the book, including the author’s single mother, criminal siblings, and racist neighbors. Still, I enjoyed getting the author’s perspective, as the author is writing about his experiences as a child. But, as the book progressed I found myself losing interest. First, I was having trouble keeping track of all the characters, many of whom are siblings, but many are not. I should have started a list when I began reading the book. Second, I began to feel as if I were stuck in a waiting room, forced to watch The Jerry Springer Show. I didn’t think very highly of these people when I lived in Boston, and a more intimate portrayal does not help. In fact, they’re more dysfunctional than I thought.Boston has changed (and so has Southie), but the time I lived there is chronicled in this book. It was a year that persuaded me that I fit better in Los Angeles.Bottom line: I would grab a tablet to write down the names of all the characters as they appear, open Google Maps to South Boston, at the intersection of 8th Street and Dorchester Street (not Dorchester Avenue), and the traffic circle where Old Colony meets Columbia and Preble. Rotary Liquors is what was once the HQ for Whitey Bulger’s criminal enterprise. Read the book for as long as it holds your interest. If you can get through the litany of death and disaster in the middle, the story gains an adult perspective and once again commands attention.

This deeply moving biographical novel succinctly captures the eternal and historical struggle of the integrated relationship between racism and classicism in America. The trials and tribulations of a poor, large, White Irish family living in a Boston housing project clearly reflect the exact same life experiences of other poor ethnic/racial groups trying to make it and survive in this land of promised opportunity.Although the South Boston Bulger gangster phenomenon serves as a Greek chorus to the times, this passionate family story itself totally overshadows that scourge and underscores the unending challenges, desperation, and heartache of living poor in America.Adjust the color lens and, historically, you witness how political "saviors" prey on the vulnerabilities of the innocent and uninformed...all in the name of making America great again.All Souls takes place in the late 70's when the issue of busing and desegregation dominated Boston as well as national headlines. The reputation of the "hub of the educational universe", as an overtly racist enclave, intensified greatly at that time and still lingers today.This worthwhile novel, itself, is actually timeless in its themes of family crisis, intervention, and survival.All Souls is an excellent vehicle to use in high school and college classrooms to encourage discussions on the impact of racism and classicism in today's America and the future implications of its continued course.Definitely a thumbs up selection!

This is a story that I personally wanted to read since I grew up in the area. The project Old Colony was different when I grew up everybody did indeed watch out for one another then too however it was a peaceful time. We had lots of fun. Carson Beach was a large part of my experience. Sad to read what occurred after my family moved to a different part of Southie in the projects with the start of bussing. This is a gripping story. I am reading the follow up book now wonderful even though I am not familiar with all the details I do relate to the depth of both books well written.

The story of the MacDonald family was at times inspiring, while at the same time discouraging. There was a sense of doom and anger as I read the story of the MacDonald siblings, one-by-one, succumbing to the inevitable fate pre-ordained by their environment and their own foolishness and recklessness. The family is a peculiar mix of raw intelligence and ability crossed with ignorance and gullibility. I found myself alternating between tears of sympathy and an impulse to think, "serves you right, fool!". The story was, at times, repetitious and disconcerting, but a combination of morbid curiosity and personal investment in the fate of the characters kept me coming back. Ultimately, the author emerges, not so much in triumph, but an inspiring example of dogged determination.I like real stories about real people. The MacDonald family and their saga are about as real as it gets.

This is not a heart warming story. It is about loss, struggle and perseverance. It makes you realize what this Boston family and their neighborhood when through, is not much different that what lots of cities (Chicago, LA, Detroit, NY) in America are going through today. Drugs, gang violence, murder and the corruption of our political system.It is like the ago old saying "The more things change, the more they stay the same".It is a good read, if you can deal with all the hardship and struggle.

While this is a fantastic book in many, many respects and I found it compelling and couldn't put it down for several days until I reached the other shore, I'm sure it wasn't written for readers to simply enjoy as an interesting and oft-times amusing piece of Irish American social history. The story for me is essentially about what it takes to survive in a society created on the basis of division, exclusion and powerlessness. Ma MacDonald is a fighter to the core. I knew her in the lives of many other women here in Derry who fought to survive and to allow their families to survive during the long troubles. One such woman is my wife's mother, Maureen English, who lost two sons in 1981 and 1985, She died in 2005 and until very shortly before her death she fought with great dignity to keep everybody else going in their daily lives. I always wonder how women like Ma MacDonald and Maureen English did it. The storyline of this book is written more from the heart than from the head and ends in the spirit of fighting against all the odds for a better life for the left-behind and marginalised. Well done Michael Patrick MacDonald; I'm sure you're ma is proud of you!

This is one of the best books I have ever read.Michael Patrick MacDonald lets us know, against the run of descriptions of life in Boston, what it was like to grow up in poverty and under the control of drug gangsters.He showed also how brave families fought against it.He is proof of how, despite multiple disadvantages, a person of strength and character can come through.I find it relevant in Northern ireland today where there are similar problems, particularly in loyalist communities, and where there are those who are keeping good people down, both by starting youngsters on drugs and making money from them and by claiming that they are better thant others - our great wee country mentality.In the meantime the poor are funding the lifestyles of those who hold them down and the "leaders" are apparently held in esteem by our authorities, police and government. just as in South Boston.

I loved this book, the passion, heartbreak and deep family love were all visable in this well written book. I love that the author found his passion in the pain and loss his family experienced and he didn't get lost as a result of it, like some young people could have.

A very touching story.. I am not from Southie, Boston or the United States as a matter of fact but I very much enjoyed reading this book. At times the pain and loss is so unreal that I had to stop and think for a moment that .. "This is REAL. This actually happened. A family and especially a mother actually experienced all this loss and pain". I can't imagine what they went through and my heart ached for them all in this book. The book has opened my eyes to a place I never knew existed and it was nice to be 'there' with this story.

Oh, my Goodness; what a slog. I gave up half way through as it was apparent to me that nothing good was going to happen. Such hatred and bigotry; makes life not worth living.