Did the Toronto Star steal this article from some junior high newspaper? Speaking of junior high, I learned a vocabulary word in 7th grade English class that I thought I'd never use, but here's the perfect opportunity--"sophomoric".
Here is a Very interesting commentary on Mr Barclay from a book review on one of his works. Apparently he is known as a humorist. I never heard of him during the twenty years that I lived in Canada. He must be an Ontario phenom. See the comment on Dave Barry. [I don't want to add any html to this post.]
^^^^^^
Last Resort: A Memoir
by Linwood Barclay
Published by McClelland & Stewart
279 pages, 2000
ISBN: 0771010788
Reviewed by Tom Nolan
Many Canadian newspaper readers know Linwood Barclay as the byline atop a popular column in the Toronto Star, wherein the Ontario writer waxes hilarious three times a week on the absurdities of modern life, rather like a thinking man's Dave Barry.
A growing number of book readers also know Linwood Barclay as the author of three previous volumes, whose titles hint that they're propelled by the same sort of urgent humor that often causes his column's followers to laugh out loud in public: Father Knows Zilch, This House Is Nuts! and Mike Harris Made Me Eat My Dog.
But Barclay's lovely fourth book is something else again. While Last Resort: A Memoir offers plenty of earthy humor, it's also a unique coming-of-age story told with admirable candor and quiet grace.
shade of blue and then green. The lake and the far shore."
---snip---
This way and that, Linwood Barclay reaches manhood: marrying, having children of his own and coming full circle emotionally in a way that's beautifully shown at the end of this wonderful memoir. Barclay's straightforward and unadorned prose might be mistaken for the merely anecdotal; but it allows him to re-create long-ago moments with an immediacy that's palpable.
Tom Nolan is a contributing editor of January Magazine and the author of Ross Macdonald: A Biography (Scribner).