"Paddy Clarke is 10 years old. He likes Manchester United, torturing his brother, pouring salt on slugs and lighting fires. His best friend is Kevin and their names are written all over Barrytown.
Patrick knows that the life expectancy of a mouse is 18 months, that Geronimo was the last of the renegade Apaches, snails and slugs are gastropods and robbing Football Montly means four million years in purgatory.
He also knows that his mother is crying, what the smacking sound was, that Da leaves the house in silence, but he doesn't know why... "

It's hard cover, but not bigger than the usual paper back.

A book ring (within EU):
Feria (NL)
Marsala (NL)
Qantaqa (DE)
madnad (ES)
mikime (IT)
alassante (IT) <-- Now here!
...
And back to me!

If you would like to join, please send me a pm, and I'll put you up. Thanks!

Some rules:
1. When you receive the book please ensure that you journal it.
2. Read it as soon as you can, if you take longer than 1 month, please keep us all informed by posting a new entry or sending me a PM to inform me (either way I get an e-mail and I know what's up with the book).
3. When you've finished reading it, make a journal entry and contact the next person on the list.
4. If no response is received after two attempts, contact me and then next person on the list.
5. When you send the book on please make a journal entry.

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

Ergens op de Uithof gaat Paddy naar Feria.

Heb het boek ontvangen op een gezellige lunchdate met Laui, dankjewel!

Just finished this book this afternoon. It was quite different than I had imagined. I took some time getting used to the narrative style, or rather, Paddy Clarke talking. It's slow paced and structured along his thoughts and events that occur, so it seems to jump from topic to topic quite chaotically. It's not really clear in the beginning where it all leads, but I guess in the end that's not really important. I felt I only started to understood the ways of the book when I was more than halfway into it. Now, it leaves me with a very sad feeling. I didn't very much enjoy reading it, but it's definitely a good book.

Thanks for lending the book to me, Laui! I appreciate having read it. I'll send it to Marsala when I get her address.

Will be sent to Marsala today. Sorry for the delay! Enjoy!

The book arrived safely today. I will start it when I finish my current read. Thank you laui for the ring and thanks feria for sending it (don't worry about taking a long time to send it, I had plenty to read anyway :p)

10-11-2008
Just finished it. Like Feria, I had to get used to the narrative style a bit, sometimes it was confusing the way Paddy just jumps from topic to topic. But then again, I guess it also makes it more realistic, because when you think of something, usually you have sidetracks in your mind aswell, remembering other things. I liked how Paddy was trying to make sense of the world around him and the way he perceived things. I loved the relationship he had with his brother, especially how he becomes less horrible to him and realises how important his brother is to him troughout the book.

I'll send the next person a pm for his/her adress.

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

Travelling to the next reader!

Arrived safely - thanks a lot for sending and for the ring! I'll try not to take too long.

I'm very sorry for stalling the ring - I've had so many bookrings arriving in the last few weeks. I've started reading the book a few days ago. I'll try to finish it within the next week and will then send it on to the next reader.

EDIT: the book is now on its way to Spain. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to finish it in time, but as I said, I didn't want to keep the book any longer...

Received today from Qantaga today - thanks so much for the card, the tea and chocolates, too:) I will make sure I'll have read it by the time I'll send my next letter to dear mikime!

I finished this last night and sorry, I thought it was a really boring book. As the people before me said, it is really slow-paced and chaotic in its style, and I expected more important things to happen than only incidents from Paddy's fairly mischievous life and ideas. The only thing that seemed to develop somehow was his relationship with his family, but even that didn't make it interesting for me and in the end I skipped quite a lot of paragraphs.
Having read two books by Roddy Doyle now, I don't think I'll read anything else by him.

I'll send this book to mikime this afternoon hopefully.

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

The book is now on its way to mikime in Italy:)

This has just arrived. I'll read it as soon as I finish one I've already started. Thanks to madnad for sending it! :)

Miki

I've just finished this book. It's interesting, as others said it doesn't really have a plot, it just tells about the narrator's childhood through numberless episodes of his life with friends and family, some of them funny, many of them kind of cruel or violent, others kind of moving.... I really enjoyed the child's perspective and his way of understanding (or trying to) people and events around him, and his interacting with them and the reasoning behind it. It is hard sometime to follow his thoughts in written form, and I kept waiting for a purpose or a more consistent thread, apart from his parents' relationship, but even the abrupt ending doesn't give satisfaction on that.
Thanks for letting me read it! I'll send this on to alassante as soon as possible!

12 March: I sent this to alassante this morning.

It's here already! :)
Thanks, Mikime!

In a few days it's Paddy's Day. Nice to have this book to read now ;)

I enjoyed reading this book very much. I found the style very interesting and very realistic in its depiction of a child's world in Ireland during a very specific time setting. I also think there was indeed a captivating plot in the development of the boy's perception and gradual understanding of the world and people around him, until the final loss of his carefree childhood.

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

Paddy Clarke is now going back home.
The book also travelled with me to Spain while I was reading it, so it has been more places than expected ;))

Thank you again, Laui :)

Paddy's arrived home safely. Thanks all for treating him nicely and moving him on to the next reader!