Ironweed is a 1983 novel by William Kennedy. The book won a Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1984 and places 92nd on the list of 100 best novel written in English in the 20th century. The basic plot is set during the Great Depression and centers around the character Francis Phelan. Francis is an alcoholic vagrant originally from Albany New York.
He left his family after causing a car accident that killed his infant son while he may have been drunk. This is the 3rd novel in Kennedy’s Albany cycle of novels. Some of the characters from each one bleeds over into the other two novels as well.
