Closing Time

Starred review from January 26, 2009
Humorist and pop culture writer Queenan (Queenan Country
) turns the mirror on himself in this somber and funny memoir about life with father in the projects of Philadelphia. Queenan closes the chapter on his life with a verbally and physically abusive alcoholic father. Queenan’s father was a pugnacious drunk who declaimed passages from great literature and often chatted loudly late at night with God. Early in the memoir, Queenan expresses the searingly honest sentiment that becomes the refrain of the book: “I never forgave my father for the way he treated us.” Queenan spent most of his life trying to get away from this father; he found refuge in the public library, and for at least a year ran off to a seminary with the intention of joining the priesthood. After his father’s death, as he was casting about for some way to put a spin on their relationship, Queenan recalls that acting as a stenographer for his father—who in his drunken rages would reel off letters to the editor about various social injustices—was the moment when the thought of making a living as a writer first entered his head. Unsentimental and brutally honest, Queenan’s memoir captures the pathos of growing up in a difficult family and somehow getting beyond it.

March 15, 2009
Journalist and humorist Queenan's ("Queenan Country") touching and funny memoir begins by focusing on his childhood in a Philadelphia housing project in the early 1960s. He grew up with an alcoholic, abusive father, whose destructive behavior prompted the author to be different from his father and find a better life for himself elsewhere. What gave him hope when he was young was the Catholic Church, the affection of his relatives, and the local public library. Queenan discovers his path out through perseverance and inspirational father figures. At an early age, he embraces his great love of books and music and considers a career in the seminary. Queenan's early memories of typing up his father's drunken rants on social issues so his father could send them to newspaper editors lead him to try a writing career after his father's death. This honest memoir is a great read and will captivate readers who have dealt with family tragedies. Recommended for public and academic libraries.Susan McClellan, Shaler North Hills Lib., Pittsburgh

Copyright 2009 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 1, 2009
Aftereviscerating everyone fromfilmmakers to sports fans, cultural critic and humorist Queenan takes the hatchet to himself in this memoir of growing up poor in Philadelphia. The book is dominated by QueenansIrish Catholic father, the lunatic-in-chief who routinely losesseveral jobs per year and takes out his frustrations with copious amounts of booze and violent strappings of his brood. It is this relationship that frames the rest of Queenans youth, from the part-time job supervisors who become surrogate fathers to the misguided stab at seminary school as a means to escape the belt. Along the way, Queenan catalogs poverty with a specificity that is nearly exhausting; theres no romance here, only the banal and frequently hilarious chronicling of the indignity of off-brand Fig Newtons and generic versions of hit records. Queenan never met a synonym he didnt like (in under three pages, a jail is a hoosegow, calaboose, slammer, and pokey), but this loquaciousness evokes the ludicrous nature of his upbringing while providing humor few others could bring to such dark material. As isoften the case with memoirs, Queenans latter yearsare less riveting, buthis adolescencewill have readers crying tears of both sorrow and hilarity.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)