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Wayne Johnston (1) (1958–)

Author of The Colony of Unrequited Dreams

For other authors named Wayne Johnston, see the disambiguation page.

14+ Works 2,846 Members 67 Reviews 12 Favorited

About the Author

Wayne Johnston was born in Goulds, Newfoundland in 1958. He graduated with a B.A. in English from Memorial University of Newfoundland in 1978. He worked from 1978-1981 as a newspaper reporter with the St. John's Daily News. In 1981, he decided to write fiction full-time. In 1983, he graduated with show more an M.A. in creative writing from the University of New Brunswick. His first book, The Story of Bobby O'Malley, won the W.H. Smith/Books in Canada First Novel Award in 1985. His other works include The Divine Ryans, which won the 1991 Thomas Head Raddall Award and was adapted into a movie, Baltimore's Mansion, which won the Charles Taylor Prize, The Colony of Unrequited Dreams, The Navigator of New York, and The Custodian of Paradise. (Bowker Author Biography) Wayne Johnston was born and raised in Newfoundland and now lives in Toronto. show less
Image credit: Wayne Johnston at the Eden Mills Writers' Festival in 2013 By Dan Harasymchuk - Dan Harasymchuk, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=65663234

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Child abuse, relationships, mental illness, family relationships
 
Flagged
LoriRous | 3 other reviews | Jan 25, 2024 |
Percy was born with FSS (Famous Someone Syndrome), where his hands, feet, and lips are all oversized; he also has an extremely large wine-red/purple “stain” on his face. He lives in St. John’s, Nfld with his beautiful single mom and her boarder, who also teaches at Percy’s school. A frequent visitor to their house is his mom’s friend, Medina. He also realizes there will never be a girl/woman who will love him or have sex with him; he figures his only hope is his mother. The story follows Percy from about 5 years old to 15.

Ok, as distasteful as that is, the story itself wasn’t bad. Initially, it reminded me of John Irving. It was pretty slow, though. It did pick up for me as I continued on, so I temporarily thought I might rate is just a bit higher, until something at the end of the book brought my rating back down to “ok”. It was apparently set in the 1950s and 60s, but I don’t recall if that was explicitly stated in the book. There was some humour and plenty of criticism of the Catholic Church.
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LibraryCin | 6 other reviews | Apr 15, 2023 |
A tale of a sealer's son from Newfoundland at the turn of the

A tale set in late 1890's of a sealer's son from Newfoundland who meets a wealth man when they attend Princeton together. The story revolves around their relationship and betrayal by the wealthy man and how they continue to be in each other's lives to the detriment of both.
½
 
Flagged
ElizabethCromb | 5 other reviews | Mar 15, 2023 |
I don't know what I just read and I don't know how I should feel about it. I don't even know if I really want to give three stars or if I want to give no stars at all. This story has me so confused. I feel embarrassed, ashamed, dirty, sad, angry. So do I give more stars since it made me feel so much? I just don't know. I hate this book. But sometimes I love this book. Most times I hate it.

I read this novel for a book club I belong to and the other night we all met online with the author. I hadn't finished reading the book at that point so I wasn't entirely sure how things were going to end up but I had a feeling it wasn't going to be good. I was going to comment on what a great job he, the author, did at creating such unlikeable characters but thankfully I didn't! I had no idea this novel is based on true events in his life! Now that I know, this story just seems even more terrible. The things that some people live through......I have no words.

I disliked every character except Wade. They all completely sickened me to the point where I got very angry. That evil son of a bitch Hans.....don't even get me started on him. Thinking back, I guess the characters were incredibly real to me since they elicited such a feeling of detest which is what the author was going for I suppose.

The poetry was maddening. I would read the poem in the chapter and then I couldn't get myself out of the rhythm. I had to keep reading and rereading just to make sense of it all. Did I mention that I hate poetry? This novel certainly was a journey!

I don't know if I should recommend this novel or not. It is not for the faint of heart. I guess you'll have to read it and see what you think. It is full of evil people and events and the poetry almost makes a mockery of it all. This is the hardest review I have written. I don't even know how to end this, so here it is.....I'm done. The end.

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mtngrl85 | 3 other reviews | Jan 22, 2023 |

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