The story of the title deals with a little boy named Larry and his feelings towards his father. When his father returns home from World War II, Larry is resentful and jealous of losing his mother's undivided attention, and finds himself in a constant struggle to win back her affections.

The first two volumes of O'Connor's autobiography. AN ONLY CHILD is the entrancing story of an Irish childhood and a youthful involvement in the Irish rebellion which leads to internment. In MY FATHER'S SON O'Connor is released after the Civil war to begin a turbulent career as a writer, sharing his life and loves in Dublin with characters as formidable as Yeats and Lennox Robinson.

(Book Jacket Status: Jacketed)The most generous one-volume collection ever published of short stories, autobiographical writings,poetry, and essays by the writer Yeats called "Ireland's Chekhov."Selected and arranged thematically by Julian Barnes, the rich mix of writings in The Best of Frank O'Connor starts off with his most famous short story, "Guests of the Nation," set during the Irish War of Independence; chronicles his childhood with an alcoholic father and protective mother; and traces his literary influences in brilliant essays on Joyce and Yeats. O'Connor's wonderfully polyphonic tales of family, friendship, and rivalry are set beside those that bring to life forgotten souls on the fringes of society. O'Connor's writings about Ireland vividly evoke the land he called home, while other stories probe the hardships and rewards of Irish emigration. Finally, we see O'Connor grappling, in both fiction and memoir, with the largest questions of religion and...

A master storyteller explores a signature themeOver the course of his long and distinguished career, Frank O'Connor wrote many stories about priests. Some of his most iconic characters are men of the cloth, and few writers have portrayed the unique demands of the priesthood with as much empathy, honesty, and wit. This collection, edited and introduced by his widow, Harriet O'Donovan Sheehy, brings together the best of O'Connor's short fiction on the subject.From "An Act of Charity," the ironically titled tale of church efforts to cover up a curate's suicide, to "The Sentry," an exquisite blend of drama and satire sparked by the British army's invasion of a priest's onion patch, these sixteen stories capture the full range of pressures visited on the Irish clergy. "Peasants" is a lesson in what happens when a man of God places law and order above compassion, while "Achilles' Heel" reveals that even a bishop can be rendered powerless by his housekeeper. "The...