(3.5 stars) This is a great introduction for me, to author Wayne Johnston! It's his story of growing up in Newfoundland. He grew up with a strange medical condition, & in a poor family that 'relocated' a lot & maybe had some 'unique' family dynamics....but always seemed to stick together? He does a great job of telling his story in a frank & honest manner, & also gets numerous audible chuckles along the way! I will look up more of his writing....it was real good! A very interesting life!
I received an e-ARC of the book from Steerforth Press via NetGalley & return offer this, my own fair/honest review.

Johnstown’s story is heartbreaking while remaining optimistic and upbeat. Truly an inspiring story filled with family trauma, poverty, illness, and the gumption of the human spirit to overcome.

I loved this book! It's set in Newfoundland, a place I yearn to visit one day. My husband's mother was born there and I've been fascinated with it for ages. It was part of Britain until 1945, when it joined Canada but in reality it is virtually a country unto itself, with its own distintive culture, dialect, music, and food. I was curious to read a memoir of a childhood spent there. I didn't realize, when I started the book, that the author had serious health issues in his youth that are as much, if not more, a part of his story than his location -- though the two are inextricably linked due to the isolation of coastal communities and the poverty of most of the inhabitants.

This is, at its heart, a story about family. About a family beset with adversity, with enough love to carry them through. We know it has a happy ending because the author survives his childhood to write about it. Highly recommended

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this book in exchange for an honest review.
The author writes his story from only a 6 months span and it's pretty tumultuous. From being a sickly child, he tells his story of how his family treated him. His father blames the kids on him not being able to live up to his dreams but he drinks away the rent. His brothers say mean things but deep down, they're hurting and really do love their brother.
His relationship with his grandmother is sweet.

Wayne Johnston gives a raw review of his childhood that includes how sickly he was as a child growing up, living with the guilt of being born with so many ailments, having siblings and a father that found life miserable with him. His mother and Lucy seem to be his only soft places to land although Lucy knows how to throw out some one line zingers at Wayne’s expense.

We may think we survived a difficult childhood, but until you've read Jennie's Boy, we will remain clueless. Not only did Wayne Johnston survive a multitude of undiagnosed illnesses, he survived them with an alcoholic father whose drinking caused the chronic eviction from houses, mother who could forgive anything - and did, brothers who verbally abused him, and a religion that was supposed to resolve every problem.

Jennie's Boy, as Wayne was called, miraculously survived his childhood and lived to tell his story, both miracles given what he was given to work with. Wayne told his story without making it an emotional catastrophe. With the love and care from a dysfunctional family, whose greatest fear was interference from Social Services, and the love and prayers of his maternal grandmother Lucy, Wayne survived to tell his remarkable story. A story you shouldn't miss.