A World Elsewhere By Wayne Johnston

Book A World elsewhere brooklyn

The story revolves around the love hate relationship between two men Landish Druken is a poor Newfoundlander disowned by his father who adopts a delightful little boy Driven to provide for the boy who is in fragile health he contacts his wealthy and powerful friend George Vanderluyden a former Princeton classmate who invites them to live at his isolated estate and then effectively makes them his prisoners A power struggle ensues between Landish and George who wants to control the movements of everyone around him Wayne Johnston is a wordsmith One of Landish s characteristics is to turn almost every word and phrase into a pun and he does so with extraordinary skill The estate itself is modelled after Bilt built by George Vanderbilt in the North Carolina countryside in the late 1800s Reading this novel made me want to visit Bilt now a museum And the story does have a satisfactory resolution which is one of my personal requirements for a good book Hardcover The motto of Vanderland is There is a world elsewhere It s taken from Shakespeare s Coriolanus It seems an ironic motto Landish said given that it s the complaint of everyone at Vanderland that the entire world is elsewhere I love me some Newfie storytellers and Wayne Johnston is among the best of the lot A World Elsewhere opens at the turn of the twentieth century with us meeting Landish Druken living in a drafty two room garret apartment late of not quite graduating Princeton disinherited by his sealing skipper father in whose boots Landish refused to follow a young man determined to listen to his own heart and become an author I will write a book that will put in their places everyone who has ever lived It may take me as long as a month but I will not falter After five years of daily writing and daily destroying his magnum opus Landish lives a life of squalor and dissipation the only laudable thing he has ever achieved being the adoption of the infant son of a man whose death his own father caused When Landish s poverty threatens the health of young Deacon and when it seems that the authorities might swoop in to take the boy away at any moment Landish writes to his old friend from school Padgett Van Vanderluyden youngest son of the wealthiest man in America asking for employment at Van s palatial home in the mountains of North Carolina yes modelled on the Vanderbilts and the sensational Bilt erected as the largest private residence in America by a lesser heir of the family I was enjoying everything about the story to this point the hills and snowstorms and busybodies of St John s but once Landon and Deacon moved to Vanderland the book became something else no longer quite a Newfie story and I m left divided in my opinion of it. Book A World elsewhere brooklyn Van sought out Landish s friendship at Princeton because he admired the Newfie s punning wit and wicked turns of phrase While the pair had formerly both been friendless outsiders once they rented a house together and began to hold weekly salons with meals that outdid the famous Princeton dinner clubs other students began to flock to them wanting Landish to give them a clever nickname hoping to hear one of Van s famous bon mots which had been scripted beforehand for him by Landish It became Van s dream that Landish would join him at the home Vanderland that he was planning to build as soon as he gained his inheritance upon graduation The punning here is very clever and pretty much relentless but in the context of college kids stretching their imaginations it raises smiles than cringes In the present of the cold and meager attic there is something charming and roguish about the way that Landish uses wordplay to explain the ways of the world to the growing Deacon Landish told him that on this ship the men in charge of engines had what were known as engine ears which meant that they were deaf from the noise the engines made Also there were pursers who made sure that no one s purse was stolen There were men called stewards who were in charge of serving stew And other men called porters who were in charge of serving port I ll give you my stew if you give me your port Landish said but Deacon shook his head And in that context I still found the wordplay charming But when they get to Vanderland and Landish is still speaking in puns and getting drunk daily and threatening the stability of his employment there I found him a lot less sympathetic when will Landish grow up at least for Deacon s sake When Van takes a shining to the boy and expresses an interest in adopting him despite the fact that the zillionaire is a bit of a sociopath and also despite knowing that Deacon is totally bonded to the man who keeps failing him I had to wonder just a little if the sickly and undersized boy wouldn t be better off a rich man s son It made me think back to the squalor of the attic room and Landish getting drunk on the rent money needing to bring the boy along as he picked up work shovelling snow living off Church charity and food vouchers and just why would I have been worried that the authorities might come in and take Deacon away In a foreword Johnston explains that he was inspired to write A World Elsewhere after a series of extended visits to the actual Bilt and it might have been an interesting fish out of water story to send a wide eyed Newfie there la A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur s Court but Landish isn t exactly awestruck by what he sees he didn t grow up poor and he quite easily walked away from his own inheritance and after having been betrayed by Van in the past Landish feels morally superior in his presence he nearly feels sorry for Van s life in opulent self imposed exile Johnston also explains that he derived the name Vanderluyden from characters in Edith Wharton s The Age of Innocence and as both Wharton and Henry James were known to have visited Bilt Johnston inserts their presence into this book arranging a meeting between the celebrated writers and the wannabe After the briefest of introductions James declares that Landish will never be a successful author because 1 He gave up his inheritance and 2 Encumbered himself with the boy thereby denigrating the only two morally commendable choices that Landish had ever made I really didn t like or see the importance of this scene. A World Elsewhere pdfescape Much is made of fatherhood in this book who wears the cuckhold s hat who has disappointed their father the deeper meanings of inheritance and it irked me that Landish never referred to himself as Deacon s father the boy called him Landish Even when he was very young and Landish explained to the boy the hoods in life that he would go through from childhood to oldhood when Deacon asked him what stage Landish was then in he considered answering fatherhood but decided on manhood Although there is so much obvious love between Landish and Deacon I never got a handle on their relationship Was the boy an encumbrance to Landish s writing If he really cared about supporting Deacon why did Landish think his only two options were to stay in St John s where his father apparently had the power to block full time employment in the one field teaching that Landish would consider or putting himself in Van s hands who had the power and reach to destroy Landish s prospects anywhere in the world I was waiting for Landish to grow up and begin to act like the father in his relationship with Deacon and meanwhile Van is having some Daddy issues of his own and the whole thing comes to an unsatisfying incredible and pat climax I really enjoyed the parts set in Newfoundland but it all fell apart for me when Landish and Deacon left for Vanderland Landish spends most of his time in the mansion observing instead of reacting so he didn t necessarily come off as a Newfoundlander any he could have been from anywhere I probably wouldn t even have questioned the suitability of Landish acting as Deacon s guardian if they had stayed in the attic they were only barely poor than their neighbours on home turf Meh Johnston is still one of my favourite Newfie storytellers this just isn t one of my favourite stories Hardcover In May 2000 I was in Halifax Nova Scotia I had presented a paper at a conference in nearby Antigonish and had a free day before my flight back I spent part of that day indulging in a tour of the local bookstores I visited The Book Room one of the oldest bookstores in North America At that time it had been a going concern for 161 years it lasted eight succumbing in 2008 to the plague that has overtaken bookstores everywhere I asked a staff member at the bookstore to recommend some great Maritimes fiction After some back and forth about what kind of fiction I liked she came up with two suggestions First was Alastair MacLeod s No Great Mischief and the second Wayne Johnston s The Colony of Unrequited Dreams I loved both of these books Of the two Johnston is the prolific MacLeod has published but two short story collections in addition to No Great Mischief Johnston has published eight novels and I have read and in some cases reread five of them A World Elsewhere is to be blunt an unremittingly sad book It is sad with scenes of poverty of death of love gone wrong and of the tyranny of the powerful To be fair these same themes permeate all of Johnston s later novels but as this new one is a shorter work than the others the compression of sorrow finds little relief That is one way I would explain many of the negative reviews on GoodReads Despite all this sorrow the book is filled with Johnston s beautiful writing and intricate wordplay The book begins in the late 19th century in Newfoundland the setting of three of his previous novels as Landish Druken the main protagonist reflects on his sad fate there are stories of his life at Princeton and how he met Padgett Vanderluyden the youngest son of the wealthiest man in America Vanderluyden and Landish become fast friends until a scandal separates them Landish now lives in a St John s attic disowned by his father and attempting to write a novel Every night he fills pages with his thoughts every morning he burns the result He has done so for five years Through a convoluted but deep sense of honor he adopts an orphan boy and when he can no longer support them he reluctantlly writes to his wealthy friend Vandeluyden has come into his inheritance and he has retired from the world He has built a mansion in the North Carolina wilderness unlike any other located near the town of Ashton It is called Vanderland It is no feat of interpretation to see that Johnston has based the Venderluyden home on George Vanderbilt s Bilt estate in Asheville North Carolina Johnston admits and explains the appropriation in a charming endnote Eventually Vanderluyden responds to Landish s entreaties with money and an offer of sanctuary at Vanderland Landish reluctantly accepts since at Princeton Vanderluyden had invited Landish to come to North Carolina and help him build Vanderland Landish refused a decision that begins to widen the gulf between the two friends The remaining two thirds of the book tells the story of what happens when Landish and his young charge journey to Vanderland This is the core of the book since Johnston having established his characters through the backstories of Princeton and St John s can now bring them together in this bizarre gigantic home in the pines All of the people at Vanderland have some idiosyncrasies and Vanderluyden the most of all It s a fascinating story Edith Wharton and Henry James drop by one night and advise Landish on his writing it s almost gothic in it s cadences and a most fascinating story Hardcover This is my first book review in years so please bear with me I ll try not to include any spoilers This novel actually has a lot of similarities to Bram Stoker s Dracula with innocents being drawn to a castle like house in an isolated mountainous area and being unable to leave without danger to themselves at the hands of a mad man This book has very good bones but generally I found the book much weaker than Wayne Johnston s other books It was good enough to keep me going but ultimately unsatisfying in it s conclusion Nowhere near as good as his Navigator of New York and Colony of Unrequited Dreams which were superb. Book A World elsewhere brooklyn I would have liked to see character development especially in Van and Godwin and a gradual build up of tension The climax seemed contrived as if the author wanted to quickly wrap the story up and get on with something else Tension builds up but there s simply not enough of it The characters give away their secrets too matter of factly without the tension of gradually being forced to This is unfortunate since I think the book had so much potential with the grand gothic house of Vanderland as it s main backdrop and a very interesting story line The chapters that occur in Newfoundland are charming as is Landish s way with words and stories The relationship between Landish and Deacon is heart warming but Landish s decisions about it don t have the full emotional impact I think they could of had that part is just too flat to me. EPub A World elsewhere university To summarize a good quick read but could have been so much Hardcover If I didn t have to read this book for book club I don t think I would ve struggled through and continued til the end I found the first three quarters of the book tragically boring but the last quarter kept me turning pages I still give it 2 stars because you should have your reader engaged at page 1 not page 200 The puns were witty and funny but I found it unbelievable that like 3 4 characters kept using them I think that kind of humour should have just been part of Landish s character It was also interesting to learn that the book was partly based on the Vanderbilt family as I had no idea until I read the author s note at the very end of the novel All in all it was an okay book Struggle through it if you wish You just might be satisfied by the end of it Hardcover Beloved author Wayne Johnston returns to the territory of his 1 national bestseller The Colony of Unrequited Dreams with this sweeping tale of ambition remorse and hope A World Elsewhere has all the hallmarks of Wayne Johnston s most beloved and acclaimed novels outsiders yearning for acceptance dreams that threaten to overpower their makers and unlikely romance It is an astounding work of literature that questions the loyalties of friends family and the heart At the centre of this story is a mystery the suspected murder of a child This sweeping tale immerses us in St John s Princeton and North Carolina at the close of the nineteenth century Landish Druken is a formidable figure broader than most doorways quick witted and sharp tongued As a student at Princeton he is befriended by George Vanderluyden son of one of the wealthiest men in America Years later when Landish and his adopted son turn to Vanderluyden for help he invites them to his self constructed castle and pulls them into his web of lies and deceit A World ElsewhereLandish Druken is from Newfoundland and while attending Princeton meets George Vanderluyden They have a falling out but years later Vanderluyden has since built a mansion is married and has a daughter He takes in Landish and the boy Landish has taken in Deacon I have to admit to being quite distracted as I read the first 2 3 of the book so I know I missed some things For the first 1 3 of the book I kept reading Landish s last name as Drunken Oops It got better though still wasn t terribly exciting for the last 1 3 of the book when I was able to better focus on it There were a few twists at the end I actually smiled at the dedication and the acknowledgments I knew his parents and it was dedicated in loving memory of them I was a good friend of his youngest sister so have met some of her siblings as well all mentioned in the acknowledgments though I ve never met Wayne Of course that s just a personal reaction to those parts of the book that really don t have to do with the book itself Hardcover This book was an unexpected surprise read Although I have thoroughly enjoyed all the Wayne Johnston books I have read this one wasn t on my radar until recommended by a friend Once started I couldn t put it down Was it filled with incredible suspense and intrigue No filled instead with larger than life characters settings that almost took over the plot and a writing style that made me laugh feel shocked saddened and surprised all at once Hardcover Ugh another author who is so in love with his own writing that he overdoes everything he writes I bought this book thinking that it was set in modern times Unfortunately for me it was not It s set back in the late 1800s I have nothing against novels written during that time period if they re interesting This one is not at least for me. Book A World elsewhere brooklyn The author does have some witty sayings but they re so few and far between that they cannot begin to hold my attention He s writing about a would be writer who s trying to write a novel He writes then he rereads what he s written and then he burns it because it isn t good enough in his mind At one point he said that it was so bad he wished he could burn it twice I thought that was amusing. Book A World elsewhere meaning I cannot recommend this to anyone but if you wish to try it go ahead Just don t say i didn t warn you Actually it would be a good book to keep on hand if you sometimes have trouble falling asleep Hardcover After a very long buildup at least the first 100 pages the story finally took off and became a page turner for me All the main characters are flawed but interesting and the author shows some pretty amazing wordplay skills Years ago I visited Bilt which is the model for Vanderland in the story and I liked the idea of some true overlay to the story But the actual story line is quite original though the ending seemed a bit rushed This was my first Wayne Johnston book and I have Colony of Unrequited Dreams to look forward to soon Hardcover Fell in love with Landish and Deacon held my breath when I thought Van was going to harm the boy but felt the ending was a little too abrupt Beautifully crafted witty and at times a very tender story Hardcover.