Martin John, Anakana Schofield
Martin John, Anakana Schofield
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Martin John

Author: Anakana Schofield

Narrator: Anakana Schofield

Unabridged: 6 hr 42 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Knopf Canada

Published: 03/31/2020


Synopsis

Martin John’s mam says that she is glad he is done with it. But is Martin John done with it? He says he wants it to stop, his mother wants it to stop, we all want it to stop. But is it really what Martin John wants? He had it in his mind to do it and he did it. Harm was done when he did it. Harm would continue to be done. Who will stop Martin John? Will you stop him? Should she stop him?

From Anakana Schofield, the brilliant author of the best-selling Malarky, comes a darkly comic novel circuiting through the mind, motivations and preoccupations of a character many women have experienced but few have understood quite so well. The result confirms Schofield as one of the bravest and most innovative authors at work in English today.

About The Author

ANAKANA SCHOFIELD is the author of the acclaimed, Giller Prize-shortlisted novel Martin John (2015), which was also a finalist for the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize, the Goldsmiths Prize in the UK, a New York Times Editors' Choice, and named a best book of the year by the Wall Street Journal,The Globe and Mail, National PostSunday Business PostToronto Star, and The Irish Times, among others. Her debut novel Malarky (2012) won the Amazon.ca First Novel Award, the Debut-Litzer Prize for Fiction in the United States, and was a finalist for the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize. Her writing and reviews have appeared in The GuardianThe Irish TimesThe Globe and MailNational PostLondon Review of Books blog, and The Long Gaze Back: An Anthology of Irish Women Writers. She lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Krista on June 26, 2017

Inadequate: The inadequate molester is the sex offender who least resembles social and behavioural norms. He is characterized as a social misfit, an isolate, who appears unusual or eccentric. He may be mentally ill and prefers non-threatening sexual partners. Martin John, the novel, is an uncomfo......more

Goodreads review by Peter on October 31, 2016

I was surprised to read some reviews describing this book as a comedy. Though it contains a number of hilarious scenes, to me it is primarily a sad and disturbing portrait of a vastly troubled mind. But whatever about the categorization of the book, Martin John Gaffney is a character that will not b......more

Goodreads review by Daisy on December 03, 2022

A phenomenal book. Audacious in the subject matter and in its structure which confounds the reader’s feelings about the eponymous character. Initially MJ is a sympathetic character, forced from his native Ireland to a London by ‘that thing’ and repeatedly told by his mother to work only nights, to n......more

Goodreads review by Doug on October 24, 2020

Not really sure what to make of this; its nomination for the Goldsmiths Prize (for innovation in literature) makes sense, as the style is fairly unique - but innovative does not necessarily equate to excellence, and in this case I was more bored than shocked (perhaps becoming numb to sexual predatio......more

Goodreads review by Paul on November 02, 2018

Martin John starts with the rather striking opening page: "Index 1. Martin John has made mistakes. 2. Check my card. 3. Rain will fall. 4. Harm was done 5. It put me in the Chair." These 5 "refrains", as well as the disjointed narrative style, will recur throughout the novel. Shortlisted for the 201......more