The narrative begins when Frank is four and in Limerick, not in New York City where he was born. It is the 1930s, and Limerick in the winter is wet, damp, and disease-ridden. Frank’s father, Malachy McCourt, is a man from Antrim in the north of Ireland. He grew up in trouble with the Irish and English, and it was rumored that he was in the Old IRA until he had to escape from the authorities. Frank’s mother is Angela Sheehan; she is from Limerick and named for the Angelus that rang the midnight hour when she was born on New Year’s Eve. Angela grew up poor with her two brothers, Pat and Thomas, and her sister, Aggie. Her mother provided her with the fare to travel to America and soon after arriving, she met Malachy.

Angela’s cousins, Delia and Philomena are religiously devout and upright and confront Malachy Sr. about Angela’s “interesting condition”—a euphemism for pregnancy. The pair accuses Malachy of being Presbyterian, which they say accounts for the sinful act of conceiving a child out of wedlock, and they intimidate him into marriage with Angela.