Courtney McGrailCounting My Blessings: Francis Brennan’s Guide to Happiness
by Francis Brennan
(Gill & Macmillan, €14.99)
When, far into this book, I read that Francis Brennan holds that the milk should be added to one’s cup before the teas is poured, I realised that here is a man who truly knows what it is all about. This is the only way to have one’s tea – mere taste would demand it, but some years ago in America scientists discovered that it gives the best emulsification.
Now this is not a trivial matter. As Francis Brennan so rightly observes, in daily life “it’s the little things that count”. This has long been his philosophy of both life and business, and his success in both fields shows how right he is.
Thanks to his television shows, especially At Your Service with his brother John, Francis Brennan is one of the best known hoteliers in Ireland. This book is a sort of autobiography, even though in some places he is very reticent.
He is clearly a nice man: he has a kind word for everyone, even Denis O’Brien (though from what one hears elsewhere, this is true). Indeed, the only people to receive a sharp reproof were the Christian Brothers in Westland Row, whose ill treatment of himself and John, a dyslexic, he still resents. And rightly so.
Yet at the heart of his characters, his life and his success he admits in a later chapter in this book, there lies a well of spirituality, his reliance on religion. He also makes no parade of piety, but explains that his religion is of what might be seen as ‘old fashioned’: Sunday Mass, a rosary and a bottle of holy water in his suitcase, and summer work at Lourdes helping the pilgrims.
Faith
It is the sort of straight forward faith that many share, and are equally reticent about. But it seems from what he says here that is the core around which all the other strands of his life are thickly wound.
However, this book is essentially a very warm and amusing book, filled with good stories, and accounts of a very varied range of characters. His account of his early years, and his start in life is very interesting, but so too are the chapters about catering, hotels, and travels far and wide. It is in fact the sort of book one sits down with for half an hour in the evening, and finds oneself still reading at 2 o’clock in the morning. It is very funny, which one cannot say of many books these days.
Indeed, his tale of trying to find a goose for a Christmas dinner is a classic. I still laugh at the thought of it. In fact it is as good as a Frank O’Connor tale. If by any chance he has to give up the Park Hotel in Kenmare, he will have open to him a rich seam of good material and could recreate himself as a rival to Ludwig Bemelmans, author of Hotel Splendide and many others (including the Madeline series). I suspect this book will find its way into many Christmas stockings, and rightly so.