Alice McDermott's Ninth Hour provides a vivid account of a world seldom revealed to outsiders

Alice McDermott has claimed as her literary turf the lives of the working-class Irish Catholics in the outer boroughs of NYC and the close-in suburbs on Long Island. Her latest report on the lives for her people comes to us in her new novel, The Ninth Hour; the entire first section appeared last year in the New Yorker, in pretty much its final form I think, and I blogged on it then so pass on that part now - it's about the suicide of a subway worker, Jim, leaving behind his pregnant wife, Annie, and creating a great deal of consternation as to whether he can be buried on church grounds; one particular self-effacing nun, Sister Ste Saviour, takes the family under the protection and does her best to sanctify the burial, to no avail apparently. The novel itself picks up from this section with a generational leap forward in a chapter called And Then, and from that point we see the life of the widow and her now-teenage daughter, Sally (after Sr Ste Saviour), who is largely raised in the basement of the convent where her mother works, alongside the fabulously named Sister Immaculata, in the convent laundry. Over the next 100 pp or so we see a lot about life in the convent - and outside of it, as Sally thinks she may want to become a novice and in preparation goes on rounds with an older sister taking care of the ill and the lame. Does this sound like an interesting novel? Probably not to most readers - so I can only add that McDermott's writing is so vivid, her knowledge or her territory so complete and detailed, her sense of humor - and of the hardships of life - particularly as expressed through her characters is so on point and sharp that even this dark material completely holds the interest of this Jewish-American reader. McD. also takes another generational leap forward - the novel is told out of sequence but it's easy enough to follow - as we see that Sally did not become a nun but raised a family on Long Island, and one of the children of that family is the narrator, though she uses the first-person plural, as if she may be delivering an extended funeral oration on behalf of herself (or himself? seems less likely given the intimate knowledge of women's lives) and her siblings. This is not the most dramatic novel one will ever encounter, but some of the scenes - in the laundry room, on visits to the elderly and the abused, the small apartment in the aftermath of the suicide - are as powerful and persuasive as any you'll read, and the threads of the novel seem to tie together neatly. It's a novel of time and place, and a surprisingly detailed look at a world seldom revealed to outsiders.

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