NYC BOOK AWARD 1999
'Tis: A Memoir
Frank McCourt
When Frank returns to America in 1953, he works on the docks, always resisting what everyone tells him, that men and women who have dreamed and toiled for years to get to America should "stick to their own kind" once they arrive. Somehow, Frank knows that he should be getting an education, and though he left school at fourteen, he talks his way into New York University. There, he falls in love with the quintessential Yankee, long-legged and blond, and tries to live his dream. But it is not until he starts to teach -- and to write -- that Frank finds his place in the world. The same vulnerable but invincible spirit that captured the hearts of listeners in Angela's Ashes comes of age.
"In 'Tis, the impish Frank McCourt paints a howlingly funny portrait of New York in the 1950's combining the strands of public school (in)discipline, street-level racial politics and shotgun marriages!" - Hope Cooke
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