Thriller writer Linwood Barclay champions Jennie's Boy by Wayne Johnston
Canada Reads will air March 17-20 on CBC TV, CBC Radio and CBC Books
Thriller writer Linwood Barclay is championing the memoir Jennie's Boy by Wayne Johnston on Canada Reads 2025!
Barclay is the bestselling author of over 20 books including I Will Ruin You, Find You First and Broken Promise.
The great Canadian book debate will take place on March 17-20. This year, we are looking for one book to change the narrative.
The debates will be hosted by Ali Hassan and will be broadcast on CBC Radio One, CBC TV, CBC Gem, CBC Listen, YouTube and CBC Books. Canada Reads airs at 10 a.m. ET (11 a.m. AT, 1:30 p.m. NT) on CBC Radio One and 1 p.m. ET (2 p.m. AT, 2:30 p.m. NT) on CBC TV. You can tune in live or catch a replay on the platform of your choice.
Writers on writers
Barclay knows a thing or two about what makes a great book — the Toronto author is a New York Times bestseller whose work has been translated into more than two dozen languages. While most of his books are adult novels, he's also written the middle-grade titles Escape and Chase.
Before Barclay turned to writing thrillers full time, he worked in newspapers, most notably as a columnist for the Toronto Star.
Many of Barclay's books have been optioned for film and television and he penned the screenplay for the movie Never Saw It Coming, adapted from his novel of the same name. His books The Accident and No Time for Goodbye were made into a television series in France.
Bringing a memoir to the table
"If you're going to be a writer, you're reading a lot of different things. And you've always got a book on the go," said Barclay in an interview with CBC Books in 2020.
One book that really stuck with him was the comically dark memoir Jennie's Boy, so he decided to champion it on Canada Reads 2025.
Jennie's Boy is a memoir that recounts a six-month period in Wayne Johnston's chaotic childhood, much of which was spent as a frail and sickly boy with a fiercely protective mother. While too sick to attend school, he spent his time with his funny and eccentric grandmother Lucy and picked up some important life lessons along the way.
Johnston is a writer, born and raised in Goulds, N.L. His novels include The Divine Ryans, A World Elsewhere, The Custodian of Paradise, The Navigator of New York and The Colony of Unrequited Dreams. His 1999 memoir, Baltimore's Mansion, won the RBC Taylor Prize. The Colony of Unrequited Dreams was shortlisted for the Giller Prize and was a 2003 Canada Reads finalist, when it was championed by now prime minister Justin Trudeau.
"I looked at all the years that I could remember and tried to pick out which one was most representative of what life was like, not just for me, but for my family of three brothers and my mom and dad — my mom, most people call Jennie," Johnston told Shelagh Rogers on The Next Chapter.
It was kind of the funniest year in a lot of ways, a bit sad in some other ways.- Wayne Johnston
"It was kind of the funniest year in a lot of ways, a bit sad in some other ways. And even though the book is called Jennie's Boy, I kind of struggled with the notion of calling it Lucy's Boy.
"That was my grandmother. I was her pet. And that's why I talked about it."
