In the following review, Foster examines the McCourt phenomenon, and casts doubt on the veracity of some parts of Angela's Ashes.
What makes a publishing phenomenon—not merely a "best-seller seller," but a million-seller, a prizegatherer, a cult-former, a legend still ensconced in the hardback charts when it goes straight to the very top of the paperback charts? It seems clear that hitting the jackpot requires not so much that people read a book as that "readers" buy a book to satisfy a felt or perceived need. Actually finishing the book may not be necessary. One suspects that very few people know how Stephen Hawking's A Brief History of Time, or Jung Chang's Wild Swans, or Dava Sobel's Longitude, ends.
The jaw-dropping success of those books testifies to the eternal human sense of gratification through self-betterment; mingled,.....
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