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Journal Entry 2 by goatgrrl from New Westminster, British Columbia Canada on Saturday, March 31, 2007
 Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha is set in Barrytown, a fictional working class neighbourhood in Dublin's Northside, believed to be a thinly disguised Kilbarrack (where Doyle once worked as a school teacher). The year is around 1966 or 1967 (the novel takes place over approximately two years), and Patrick "Paddy" Clarke, the book's narrator, is about ten years old. He lives with his parents and his younger brother Francis ("Sinbad", so named because his round cheeks remind Paddy and his mates of Sinbad the Sailor), but spends most of his time running with a pack of friends around Barrytown, which seems to be in a state of near constant construction.
Life is good for Paddy, if punctuated by a steady barrage of low-level violence: corporal punishment at school, the smacks, pinches and "dead legs" he exhanges with his brother, fights between friends and neighbourhood enemies alike and the occasionally ritualized violence of make believe games. He loves his Ma and Da, and routines around the Clarke home seem gentle and familiar. Then slowly, inserted between the tragicomic tales of Paddy and his friends' exploits, we begin to glimpse the possibility that life for Mr. and Mrs. Clarke isn't as congenial as all that. An undercurrent of hostility leads to more open squabbling, then to the occasionally overheard smack. From time to time, Paddy's Da doesn't sleep at home. Then he begins to drink too much.
Paddy Clarke is a simple story, humorously told, with an ending which is at once ordinary and heartbreaking.
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Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha
