From Publishers Weekly
In the bestselling McCarthy's Bar, McCarthy had one rule: never pass a bar with your name on it. In Road it's: never pass a part of the world with your name in or on it. Thus this genealogist-cum-pint-swilling adventurer embarks on a frolicsome, drunken globe-trot to uncover the roots of all things McCarthy and in the process expose what it means to be a McCarthy and, by extension, to be Irish. It's a lively, lusty quest; McCarthy travels like a Renaissance explorer with a film director's lens. In Tangiers, he finds a Moroccan McCarthy who puts a unique spin on the term "black Irish." He takes in America's premier Irish event, New York's St. Patrick's Day Parade (which he finds more Celtic and American than Irish and not a little Scottish besides). Next stop: Tasmania, the penal colony where so many Irish were sent by the British government. And how could he resist a visit to the town of McCarthy, Alaska, population 18? The ultimate mocking tour guide with acerbic charm, McCarthy delivers scathing critiques of people and places, himself included. His droll and often drunken existentialist view proffers a unique (and distinctly Irish) perspective on the world that is part history, part McCarthy's Law. Some may be put off by his frequent references to drugs, sex and overimbibing, but McCarthy is like a character out of contemporary Irish literature, a traveler on a winding road surrounded by life's imperfections yet finding them beautiful despite it all (especially after a pint or two). Photos, maps.Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
McCarthy is one very funny man, and this is one very funny book. We last heard from him in the equally hilarious McCarthy's Bar (2001), in which he was searching for his Irish roots in Ireland. The journey continues, but now the indefatigable Anglo-Irishman expands his horizons to jaunt about the globe, from unlikely Tangier to that traditional Irish bastion, New York. As his readers well know, McCarthy will go anywhere and everywhere as long as a pint (or two) in a cozy pub awaits at journey's end. He risks life and limb, such as when he faces, with utmost courage, a rabid crowd of drunken Scots Catholic soccer fans, come from Glasgow to celebrate Paddy's Day in Manhattan. Betimes he stays closer to home, at an Ireland versus England rugby match in Dublin, for instance, but really, how can he resist visiting Tasmania, Montserrat, Butte (Montana), and a tiny (population 18) Alaskan town that somehow bears his name? Infectiously funny. June Sawyers
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FROM THE PUBLISHER

Pete McCarthy established one cardinal rule of travel in his bestselling debut McCarthy's Bar: "Never pass a bar with your name on it." In this equally wry and insightful follow-up, Pete's characteristic good humor, curiosity, and thirst for adventure take him on a fantastic jaunt around the world in search of his Irish roots -- from Morocco, where he tracks down the unlikely chief of the McCarthy clan, to Rocky Sullivan's in New York, where he braves a crowd of stratospherically drunken Scotsmen in the midst of their St. Patrick's Day celebrations -- just before he is engulfed by a sea of green plastic bowler hats on Fifth Avenue. After clocking thousands of miles and landing in more than a few exotic locations, he finally reaches his coveted destination: a remote and sparsely populated Alaskan town (named McCarthy, of course) where the eighteen townspeople are far outnumbered by the bears. Risking life, limb, and liberty in an almost heroic effort to trace his own lineage, he also happens to discover the peculiar and fascinating history of McCarthys everywhere while managing to down a few good pints along the way. Packed with unexpected detours and dozens of hilarious moments, The Road to McCarthy is a quixotic and anything but typical Irish odyssey that confirms Pete McCarthy's status as one of the funniest and most incisive authors writing today.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

In the bestselling McCarthy's Bar, McCarthy had one rule: never pass a bar with your name on it. In Road it's: never pass a part of the world with your name in or on it. Thus this genealogist-cum-pint-swilling adventurer embarks on a frolicsome, drunken globe-trot to uncover the roots of all things McCarthy and in the process expose what it means to be a McCarthy and, by extension, to be Irish. It's a lively, lusty quest; McCarthy travels like a Renaissance explorer with a film director's lens. In Tangiers, he finds a Moroccan McCarthy who puts a unique spin on the term "black Irish." He takes in America's premier Irish event, New York's St. Patrick's Day Parade (which he finds more Celtic and American than Irish and not a little Scottish besides). Next stop: Tasmania, the penal colony where so many Irish were sent by the British government. And how could he resist a visit to the town of McCarthy, Alaska, population 18? The ultimate mocking tour guide with acerbic charm, McCarthy delivers scathing critiques of people and places, himself included. His droll and often drunken existentialist view proffers a unique (and distinctly Irish) perspective on the world that is part history, part McCarthy's Law. Some may be put off by his frequent references to drugs, sex and overimbibing, but McCarthy is like a character out of contemporary Irish literature, a traveler on a winding road surrounded by life's imperfections yet finding them beautiful despite it all (especially after a pint or two). Photos, maps. (Feb. 6) Forecast: A four-city author tour, national broadcast and print media campaign, and a postcard promotion will help target readers, and McCarthy's caustic humor should appeal to fans of David Sedaris and Joe Queenan. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

McCarthy introduced us to Ireland in his first book, McCarthy's Bar: A Journey of Discovery in the West of Ireland, which earned him Newcomer of the Year honors at Britain's Book Awards, but this time his journeys take him far from the Emerald Isle. Here he treks to Tangier to meet the deposed McCarthy M r, Prince of Desmond. Then he's off to America to see Larry McCarthy, head of the North American Clan McCarthy Association in Butte, MT, and to McCarthy, AK ("current population somewhere between 14 and 20"), where he attempts to discover the fate of James McCarthy, copper miner and town namesake. He researches the McCarthys sent to Australia as prisoners and celebrates two very different St. Patrick's Days-one in New York City and one on the Caribbean island of Montserrat. As he explores all things McCarthy ("never pass a bar that has your name on it"), his humorous and insightful comments on the Americans, Australians, Moroccans, British, Irish, and others that he meets during his travels make this a delightful memoir. Recommended for larger public libraries.-Rita Simmons, Sterling Heights P.L., MI Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews