I absolutely loved this book! I found it hard to put down. I highly recommend reading it! You won’t be disappointed.

The Good Father by Kingston-based Wayne Grady is partially set in the fictional White Falls (a small town “on the Madawaska River, between Ottawa and Peterborough” that my guess is based on Bancroft, Barry's Bay, or maybe Pembroke), as well as Vancouver and Toronto. Although it is a character-driven novel, I think it excels the most at creating a strong sense of place. The story follows Harry, a journalist turned teacher turned wine merchant, and a bit of a man-child. He can't seem to reconcile his relationship with his daughter Daphne, who is secretly struggling with addiction out on the west coast. The dual narrative takes the reader through the actions and emotions that led to their estrangement.

Having read and enjoyed Wayne Grady’s previous novels (Emancipation Day and Up From Freedom), I certainly wanted to read his latest. It did not disappoint.

The book focuses on a father-daughter relationship. Harry Bowes moves to Toronto from the small town of White Falls (“on the Madawaska River, between Ottawa and Peterborough”) to take a teaching job; he leaves behind his wife and ten-year-old daughter Daphne. He never lives in White Falls again because his marriage ends in divorce and he eventually remarries. He remains in contact with Daphne, visiting her and having her visit him, but their connection is eroded.

Daphne feels abandoned by her father, and the loving young girl is replaced by a hostile young woman who seems determined to totally destroy her relationship with Harry; she physically distances herself from him and limits contact with him. Then she abandons her studies and begins self-medicating with drugs and alcohol. A crisis brings them together physically, but will they be able to bridge the emotional distance?

I found myself frustrated with Harry. He is supposed to be the adult, but he does not behave as one. He doesn’t give much thought to how his move from home will affect his daughter. He doesn’t even tell her that he’s leaving; he just assumes she will be alright: “The relationship and trust and companionship he had built up with her over the years would ripen.” Later, when it’s obvious that Daphne is not doing well, he has to be pushed to make more than a cursory effort to contact her. Rather than reach out to find out exactly what Daphne is doing, he imagines best-case scenarios, “picturing her in a bright, cheerful apartment, with hardwood floors and tall windows that let in plenty of sunlight. . . . Food in the refrigerator, healthful food, smoked salmon, Boston lettuce, and a jar of real capers . . . and a small wine rack with bottles of a clear Okanagan sauvignon blanc.” Harry is so right when he comments on his passivity: “’I think I may just have been doing what was easiest for me.’”

I sometimes found myself equally frustrated with Daphne. Her behaviour as a child is understandable; she feels abandoned by her father with whom she had a close bond. She looks for affection and attention elsewhere. As a young adult, however, she makes choices that seem to be intended to punish her father because she cannot forgive him, even when those same choices destroy her own life. She is so focused on what she sees as her father’s betrayal that she continues to blame him and wallow in self-pity when, in fact, she bears responsibility for her actions. It takes a long time for her to admit that maybe her father’s leaving was “more a mistake than a premeditated desertion.”

The novel provides a dual perspective; the reader sees both Harry and Daphne’s points of view. It is so realistic to read Harry saying, “’Daphne isn’t always there. She’s always somewhere else’” and later, when he argues, “’I was always there for you’” have Daphne counter with “’Always there, never here.’”
In Daphne’s chapters, when she is facing a personal crisis and resorts to drugs again and again, she refers to herself in the second person. This approach is somewhat disorienting but very effectively shows the chaos in her life.

There are two aspects which I particularly enjoyed. As a former English teacher, I loved the many literary allusions. Shakespeare is quoted often, but W. B. Yeats and Walter Raleigh and Matt Cohen and Robertson Davies and Edna O’Brien and Siri Hustvedt and others are referenced. Though White Falls is fictional, I grew up in the Madawaska Valley so references to “the Madawaska Valley accent” and “Madawaska Grunge” made me smile, as did mentions of Pembroke and Foymount.

The father-daughter relationship is portrayed so realistically that readers who are fathers or daughters will be inspired to examine their own relationships. The novel reminds us that love requires “So much forgiveness . . . so much overlooking of hurt, so much emphasis on intentionality” and that love has many shapes. Such a though-provoking book should be read.

The Good Father by Wayne Grady is a complex, multi perspective book that takes an in depth look at a father and daughter’s complicated relationship.

It is told from two perspectives: the daughter, Daphne who is floundering; and, the father, Harry, who is trying his best, albeit, not doing very well.

The prose in this novel makes you feel as though you are Daphne and you are Harry. You feel for them so deeply, and are very much caught in their trauma. The description puts you right there with them, without making the novel drag out. The plot was very much unexpected and I was pleasantly surprised at how it unfolded.

This is a raw look at addiction, familial relationships and grief. I enjoyed the Canadian perspectives and references.

I most definitely recommend this novel!

5 stars!

Thank you to Penguin Random House and NetGalley for the digital ARC of this novel.

As a notable Canadian author title I included The Good Father in the April installment of Novel Encounters, my regular column highlighting the month's top fiction for Zed, Zoomer magazine’s reading and book club vertical (full review and feature at link).

While the premise of this story intrigued me, overall I felt the execution fell a bit flat. I will say when I first read the title and saw the cover, before reading the description, I thought it was a thriller and not a contemporary/literary fiction. So unfortunately I think that had a play in my thoughts on the book as a whole. I think the characters had a lot of potential, and the relationship between Harry and Daphne felt realistic enough, but I think the biggest downfall was the structure. From reading the synopsis you are aware of a “catastrophic event" that will alter the lives of both Harry and Daphne. I felt the plot leading up to this is on the slower side and that it happened way too late in the narrative, not allowing the reader to see the reconnection between the two.

I did love the use of the dual perspective and the choice of using second person for Daphne’s chapters while she is abusing drugs. It’s such a disorienting style of writing that accurately depicts Daphne’s state during that period in her life. Set between Harry’s third person chapters it highlights the monotony of his chapters and the chaos of Daphne’s.