Marc's on tour, so Jamie's back!

And thinking about patterns and parallels between “Happy Songs of Death” and Frank McCourt. For those of you who have not heard, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of “Angela's Ashes” died yesterday at the age of 78.

I think he would have loved “Happy Songs.”

McCourt was never maudlin or self-pitying about his horrific childhood. He saw the comic in the tragic, and light in the dark, the joy in the despair that is life and death. He would have listened to “Won't You Come With Me” and laughed in all the right places.

By the way – as wonderful as the book was – and I have read and re-read it often – even better is the audio book with McCourt reading his own prose with a Limerick accent that 50 years in America never diluted.

Frank McCourt also introduced me to an Ireland that was real and gritty and poor – not the over-romanticized, leprechaun-infested Hollywood version. it was an Ireland I could explore from a much firmer foundation. Still beautiful, still mystical, but real.

(And don't forget you can still go with Marc on the upcoming Celtic Invasion of the gorgeous Dingle peninsula – but not much time left – and the airfares are amazing right now.)

So, raise a glass with me in saluting Frank McCourt of Limerick and New York, and thanking him for sharing an amazing journey with us. Slainte, Frank!