Savaged in Book, McCourt's Hometown Split on Legacy

The Irish town exposed in grisly detail by late son Frank McCourt in Angela’s Ashes isn’t quite sure what to do with its ignominy, the AP reports. A majority of Limerick citizens are proud—“The book was a delight and 80% true,” one historian says—but a vocal minority says McCourt fabricated a rough-and-tumble childhood to sell books. “They’ll go to their deathbeds still in denial,” the historian concludes.

McCourt himself had mixed feelings before his death yesterday. His brother says that even on his deathbed the author mulled “his unfinished emotional business with Limerick.” His supporters there, while touting the town’s turnaround since the bad old days, are standing by him. “Having come from that background,” a tour guide says, “I can tell you that Frankie wrote the truth.” (More Angela's Ashes stories.)