Orangutan: A Memoir

By Colin Broderick

Book Overview

Few people who have been slave to an addiction as vicious, as destructive, and as unrelenting as Colin Broderick's have lived to tell their tale. Fewer still have emerged from the darkest depths of alcoholism--from the perpetual fistfights and muggings, car crashes and blackouts--to tell the harrowing truth about the modern Irish immigrant experience. Orangutan is the story of a generation of young men and women in search of identity in a foreign land, both in love with and at odds with the country they've made their home. So much more than just another memoir about battling addiction, Orangutan is an odyssey across the unforgiving terrain of 1980s, '90s, and post-9/11 America. Whether he is languishing in the boozy squalor of the Bronx, coke-fueled and manic in the streets of Manhattan, chasing Hunter S. Thompson's American Dream from San Francisco to the desert, or turning the South into his beer-soaked playground, Broderick plainly and unflinchingly charts what it means to be Irish in America, and how the grips of heritage can destroy a man's soul. But brutal though Orangutan may be, it is ultimately a story of hope and redemption--it is the story of an Irish drunk unlike any you've met before.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0307453405
• ISBN13: 9780307453402
• Release Date: December 2009
• Publisher: Crown Publishing Group (NY)
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 0.63 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 5.3" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

Powerful!!

I was completely engrossed with this book. The writers experiences and the way he tells his story is captivating. He makes you feel and experience all that is going on. The way Mr. Broderick tells his tale has you feeling that you are a part of his life. By the end of the book I had a tear in my eye thinking " Please put down the drink". It is a powerful book and I have already reccomended it to several friends. Having spent several years of my life hunting around a similar bar scene and meeting many people that are like Mr Broderick, I feel I now understand them just a bit more.

You cannot put this book down until its over, and then read it again, but not as addictive as James

Do you like reading Irish Bull? Read this piece from what sounds to be Molly Bloom and Blazes Boylan's illegitimate great great great grandson born fifty miles from Belfast. Often in this book you will passages in which your incredibility must be suspended. But then I remember that if my own life were ever to be chronicled, much would be rejected as incredible. Believe it. Doubtless our skepticism would diminish were we to find greater character development. Characters are often vividly and compellingly sketched, yet remain but a sketch upon a bathroom stall, devoid of clear motivation and back story. Like, why are these people doing this? Especially the young women! One of my uncle's jokes in our Irish Catholic family were name the shortest books in the world, one of which being Great Irish Lovers. This author sets out to prove that old joke empty, and winds up with impossible women. But, hey, whom I to say it is bull, or boasting, or fiction. The whole courtship and first meet-the-family seems, well, stretched. As with the effects of imbibing and inhaling on workmen the following day. So, like, he gets his brains bashed in on a sidewalk, and stands and goes to work in the morning? Nevertheless, pick up this book when you have time to read it through. You may not put it down again until it is over, even if work demands the morning. The main metaphor coming to mind for the reading of this book must be a mid-town subway, blasting through stations, with brilliant and beckoning sights calling from each platform, quickly abandoned, but compellingly moving on. I would love to hear more of his life in Ireland under ongoing occupation, far more than a quick mention to friends killed by the occupation army, of passing through checkpoints, or not. This for me is fascinating, and important reading, but we only see it quickly, as background to his pain, to his rush forward, to his need for powerful distractors. He mentions early "I had never lived in a place where I was free to be Irish." The writing is beautiful, strong, and fast. His first sight of Manhattan evokes this passage: "I remembered seeing it now, Manhattan, a silhouette of skyscrapers, like black headstones against a hazy orange sky." Yes, that image from The Inferno fits my own experience. This author writes op-ed pieces for the New York Times, and writes well, and rushes you along without a break. I would prefer to stop and smell the roses and ask that person why in the world are you doing that, but the writing moves us onwards. The book is divided into several sections. Three Rivers Press provides interesting graphic lay-out, including the cover art and the font for the different sections, which begin with FNG, acronym which you must read the book to understand, one of the unexpectedly few cuss words here. Some might consider this along the lines of the Montreal immigrant saga Cockroach: A Novel, but whereas that is more spacey, this is as hard and direct, and fast, as Ne

utterly irresistible

The problem I have with many so-called "recovery" stories, is the thinly veiled badge of honor that many of them wear. I have little time for the kind of false bravado of the addict/alcoholic -- the "I've been to Hell and back" kind of smugness. And although Colin Broderick's descent into drug and alcohol fueled mayhem has all of the hallmarks of the genre -- the insanity, the denial, the death defying madness -- it is never gratuitous nor self-serving. He neither glorifies nor condemns it, he simply takes us there, bravely, unflinchingly and without apology. He also transcends it because the story is ultimately a universal one -- the struggle to become the person he's supposed to be. And the honesty and humor of his recounting is utterly irresistible. I put him with the bold new generation of Irish writers that are coming into their own, right up there with Colum McCann. Read this and remember where you discovered him first because he's definitely one to watch for the future.

Brutally Honest, No Regrets Memoir

It's been quite a while since I've read a memoir by a man, but this one drew me in by the blurbs, especially the one by Billy Collins, a favorite poet of mine. Colin attended some classes taught by Mr. Collins at a local college and that's how they became acquainted. I also know more alcoholics than non-alcoholics having grown up with kindly (for the most part) drunks and am fascinated by their stories. The book opens with Colin arriving in NYC and immediately going to work in the construction business with his Irish family members and friends. I have to say I admired his work ethic and the loyalty of his family. They stuck by him through thick and thin and never gave up on him. In spite of hard drinking every night, he always managed to get up and get to work. That's saying something for a man who drank and drugged as heavily as Colin did. His story is brutally honest, raw and painful, yet beautifully written. I almost cringed at some of the violence, especially when he got his butt tore up when trying to score cocaine a few times. But like he said at the beginning: it's his story. The vein that kept me intrigued was Colin's fierce, unwavering desire to be a writer and his tenacity in achieving that goal. He's a good writer and told his story skillfully and candidly. His stints in the local theatre were also fascinating and inspiring to read. Colin, I applaud your ambition and success in getting this book written and published and I wish you every success in the future. I hope you continue writing because you are truly talented.

A Brilliant Book; Beautifully Written

Orangutan is the true story of Colin Broderick, an Irish immigrant who found himself in New York City, earning a living in the construction trade; where a few hours of dusty, hard work allowed him and his compatriates a pocketful of cash to drink all night on. Soon alcohol wasn't enough for the author, and he began using cocaine. That's when things take a dangerous turn, and the stories he tells reminds you of the infamous luck of the Irish. (There might be some truth to it.) The author involved himself with interesting women; he was seemingly unable to remain single. The different personas of the girls he entertained makes the book even better; Broderick tried to maintain relationships with unique and interesting females from different cultures and backgrounds, and the majority of them partied almost as much as Broderick. (The author has a good dry run in his mid-twenties and just as the book starts to get boring and you wonder where it's going - he loses everything and starts drinking again.) Overall I found the story to be captivating and real, with quite a bit of humor also. The writing is excellent and I enjoyed all 335+ pages of the book! I would recommend this to anyone who is interested in reading a modern day memoir. Like Bukowski, but better.