The Divine Ryans

by Wayne Johnston

From the author of The Colony of Unrequited Dreams , "An absolute stunner--achingly funny, needle-sharp, and packing an unexpected wallop...the literary equivalent of a small-budget movie masterpiece with heart, soul, and brains"( Time Out ).

The Ryans of St. John's, Newfoundland, are a large and deeply eccentric Irish-Catholic family in the dual business of newspaper-publishing and undertaking--"one-hundred years of digging up dirt of one kind or another," as Uncle Reginald puts it. Enough Ryans also become priests and nuns to earn them the sobriquet "Divine."

The youngest member of the family is nine-year-old Draper Doyle Ryan, whose passion for the Catholic Montreal Canadiens in their battles against the Protestant Toronto Maple Leafs is matched only by his perplexity over his recently deceased father's regular reappearances, hockey puck in hand, in the house next door. How he comes to make sense of these visitations, his gently screwy relatives, and his own burgeoning sexuality forms the matter of this droll, wise, and effortlessly funny coming-of-age novel.

Soon to be a major motion picture from the producer of Love and Death on Long Island, and starring Oscar®-nominee Pete Postlethwaite.

Genres: Fiction, Canada, Book Club, Hockey, Contemporary, Drama, Family

215 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1990

About the author

Wayne Johnston was born and raised in Goulds, Newfoundland. After a brief stint in pre-Med, Wayne obtained a BA in English from Memorial University. He worked as a reporter for the St. John's Daily News before deciding to devote himself full-time to writing.

En route to being published, Wayne earned an MA in Creative Writing from the University of New Brunswick. Then he got off to a quick start. His first book, The Story of Bobby O'Malley, published when he was 27 years old, won the WH Smith/Books in Canada First Novel award for the best first novel published in the English language in Canada in that year. The Divine Ryans was adapted to a film, for which Wayne wrote the screenplay. Baltimore's Mansion, a memoire dealing with his grandfather, his father and Wayne himself, won the Charles Taylor Prize. Both The Colony of Unrequited Dreams and The Navigator of New York were on bestseller lists in Canada and have been published in the US, Britain, Germany, Holland, China and Spain. Colony was identified by the Globe and Mail newspaper as one of the 100 most important Canadian books ever produced.

Reviews

[Shane · Rating 4 out of 5]

What begins as a humorous and delightful story about an idiosyncratic Catholic family, ends on an ominously tragic note when secrets come tumbling out.

Draper Doyle Ryan is a 9-year old who keeps seeing his dead father in dreams, always with a hockey puck in hand, as if wanting to tell him something. His father, Donald, has been dead a year, and the residual Ryan family, mother Linda, sister Mary, and Draper are now boarded with the matriarchal head, the widowed and childless Aunt Phil. Everyone in this family is childless except for Draper’s father: uncles Fr. Francis, Fr. Seymour, and Reginald, and aunt Sr. Louise – all barren of seed whether by choice or circumstance. The family owns a newspaper, a funeral home, an orphanage, and a convent. One begins to wonder whether Draper’s father, who used to pull all-nighters at the newspaper and disappear for periods on end, was really happy with his marital and progenitor status.

The body of the book is concerned with Draper’s ineffectual attempts to succeed in this world of secrets, convention, shame and guilt. He is sub-par at everything: at hockey (his passion), singing, tap dancing, and boxing – all mandatory requirements at “Fr. Seymour’s Number” an elite band of students into whose claws Draper is thrust by virtue of him being the only male member of the next generation of Divine Ryans. Draper’s feeble attempts at these endeavours lead to some embarrassing and hilarious situations, which led me to believe that this was the classic Newfoundland bildungsroman, replete with panting priests, frustrated widows, suppressed sexual desires, hapless heroes, and rip-roaring humour (family patriarchs go by nicknames such as Stern, Cross, Grim, and Disapproving, for example). And, there is a lot of hockey.

Yet, humour apart, strange behaviours continue to occur among various members of the family to suggest that this innocuous comedy will end in something deeper, something tragic: Draper’s worsening sexual dreams, especially those featuring a beast called Momery (half Mom-half sister Mary) that end in the shame of bedwetting; Linda’s own rebellion against the family cloister run by Aunt Phil; Uncle Reginald’s thumbing of his nose at the Catholic rules of the house despite living under Aunt Phil’s aegis and acting as the chief undertaker replete with top-hat, spats, and waistcoat; and of course, the haunting presence of Daddy Donald.

Things come to a head when the family sit down to watch the 1967 Stanley Cup final, everyone supporting the Habs, only to see the Maple Leafs win for their last time (until when again, we may never know). The flashbacks that this momentous Stanley Cup match unleash (perhaps that’s why Donald always had a puck in his hand) lead us to the discovery of what went wrong a year ago, and to the circumstances of Donald’s death. It is left with Draper, a loser in everything he has set his hand to so far, to use this knowledge and gain his nuclear family’s freedom from the claustrophobic control of the Ryans.

A delightful novel for those interested in Canadiana, and in our pet literary conflict: family dysfunction, given that we have been free of others like wars, droughts, and pestilence for a very long time (this book was published thirty years before Covid-19).

[Paula · Rating 2 out of 5]

Tries hard to be one of those enchanting, quirky,meaningful and thought provoking tales many contemporary Irish writers excel at,and fails. Spectacularly.

[David]

I’ve read this one many times, and had it on at least 20 course reading lists over the years. Every time I return to it, it is more melancholy, more bitter, less funny. The protagonist—though only 9 as events happen—takes himself seriously. The reader should do no less. It is a superbly structured book, with its classical allusions cleverly integrated into the 1967 present of St. John’s, NL, CA. In many ways, it is The Cartoon Virgil to which it alludes. But it is also much more. It is harder to re-read every time. Not even Uncle Reg—a Classic trickster—can stop the hurting, though he does his best. Aunt Phil is worse than any MePHistophILes. Lucifer gets a little paranoid when
Philomena’s about. Both Draper Doyle and his father, Donald, are programmed and conscripted to propagate the family, slaves to The Divine Ryans. Donald achieves his minimum and squirts off; Draper Doyle remains to soil underwear and be ‘psycho-oralyzed.’ It’s hilariously sad.

[Cathy · Rating 4 out of 5]

By turns very funny, and sad tale of a nine year old boy, Draper Doyle of the eminently Catholic Ryan family in St. John's NL circa mid 1960's. Surrounded by adults, bereft of a dad (passed away recently as book starts), Draper Doyle must fend off the grown-ups, an assortment of uncles who are Fathers and aunts who are Nuns or bossy widows and try to come to grips with his dad's ghost, who visits regularly for reasons that become quite clear as the book progresses. Plus, taken under the wing of Father Seymour, DD's uncle, there is much hilarity suffered by DD's lack of musical skill, boxing skill, and even though a devoted goalie and Habs fan, hapless and unskilled in hockey.
Longing to get out from under the Ryan collective thumb, Draper Doyle's mom and sister Mary unite in the goal for freedom. It does come at a price but oh, so worth it.
Growing up Catholic in Toronto same era, I saw so many true things in Johnston's telling of life in a family where discussion was a non-starter, pretending something that happened didn't, and the listing of sins for the confessional had me nodding my head vigorously, yes!
Well done, enjoyable with wonderful characters, setting, dialogue and a relatively happy ending!

[Scott Ormsby · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was a fairly quick read, and the spoilers are not because when I was a kid I was a Christmas tap-dancing elf in the movie.

The Divine Ryans is a coming of age story from a young boy growing up in Newfoundland, which spoke to me since that is also where I grew up, and as such recognized and related to the small-town culture of community and being immersed in small, local life.

Draper Doyle, the protagonist, experiences events he is trying to make sense of as a teenager, and one for him was traumatic enough it took him a while to eventually remember what he repressed: him walking in on his father having sex with another man. Later on, his father commits suicide and leave ls Draper with his mother, who is judged for being a “Come From Away” (aka Canadian mainlander). He also has seen his sister’s naked bottom and his mother’s naked top throughout unintentional encounters, leading him to have nightmares of the “Mamataur” chasing him through the labyrinth, wanting to kiss him. His Uncle Reginald serves as his therapist, and through humour and no actual training whatsoever, helps him to try and make sense of his life. In addition to the main protagonist, the rest of the family learns to unite and learn to deal with this trauma together, becoming closer as a result.

Religion and hockey were also sub-themes of the book and served as influences on his family and community, something else I can relate to. A flashback of Draper’s father describing the end of the world as the “Apuckalypse” with the sky raining down endless hockey pucks is both funny and quite Canadian.

I’d like to say the reason I deducted a star was because Draper and his family cheered for the Habs, but while the story has character development and touches upon some important themes around what makes a “proper nuclear family”, it is missing just a bit of the depth I am used to reading from other pieces of literature. This isn’t to say that I didn’t enjoy it: on the contrary, I had a few good laughs and still recommend people give it a read, especially those who come from the East Coast!

[Pauline Clark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Strange tale

Odd story about a boy. I liked the Canadian-isms, could relate to the Catholic references and even read a hockey scene aloud to my husband. Can’t say I loved it but neither did I hate it.

[Maxwell Amberfordstinskin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Funny, sweet, intensely Canadian, and surprisingly frank in depicting how a young man's grows to understand sexuality, which is not unlike a labyrinthian horror show nightmare to a nine year old. It's particularly brutal and familiar in that way, as though Johnston really remembers how strange certain adult things seem to a child. In that way, the book is rather fearless, even if the plot treads to convenient and familiar places by the story's end. Recommended.

[Lara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Funny, as only someone that really understands family can be.

[Julia K · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best Wayne Johnson book, and I’ve loved all of them

[Mindy Gough · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 Loved this. Very Canadian. Clear, poignant story. Well drawn characters who came alive in the telling. Good humour.

[Paula Dembeck · Rating 4 out of 5]

This short award winning novel has had a wide variety of reviews from readers, ranging from those who really enjoyed it to others who were puzzled or found it completely missed the mark. It is one of Johnston’s early novels (1990) and takes place in St John’s, the capital of Newfoundland, his home province.

It is a quirky and humorous tale, a coming of age story about nine year old Draper Doyle from the once prominent Ryan family who own the newspaper, the funeral home, the orphanage and the convent. But the family’s fortunes have been dwindling over the years, compounded by the fact that only two of their businesses make any money. The Ryans are an unusual family with so many of its members involved in the religious life, the townspeople refer to them as “The Divine Ryans”.

The Ryans are gradually dying off along with the family fortune made in previous years and money is tight. Despite the number of male genes in the family, it is Aunt Phil, Draper Doyle’s father’s sister who controls the Ryans. She inherited the family fortune, or what little is left of it and since she holds the purse strings she calls the shots, not only in matters of money but also what goes on in the house.

Draper Doyle’s father Donald died five months ago. He was the editor of the town newspaper The Chronicle, an unusual rag with a mish mash of news, local scandal and church events. After his death, Aunt Phil decided that Draper Doyle, his mother Linda and his older sister Mary would move in with her so their house could be rented out to help replenish the family’s dwindling fortune.

Draper Doyle introduces readers to members of his eccentric family including Uncle Reg who drives the family hearse and Father Seymour, who runs the local orphanage. Because his mother is still grieving, Father Seymour is the one who decides what happens to Draper Doyle. He runs a group called “Seymour’s Number”, a collection of Catholic boys from the orphanage who are a “cross between the Vienna Boys Choir and the Hitler Youth”. They sing, tap dance and box for charity and are a popular form of entertainment in town. Father Seymour has determined that Draper Doyle will join the group to help keep him occupied and distract him from the grief of losing his father. The fact that Draper Doyle can neither sing, dance or box, quickly makes him an outcast and Father Seymour must find a way to keep him in the group. He creates some unusual solutions which cause Draper Doyle both painful and funny moments.

As Draper Dan tells his story he shares some comic scenes of life in this unusual family. But there are also some very poignant moments as Draper Doyle tries to deal with the loss of his father whose ghost he sees everywhere. The scene in which he tries to surprise his father with a birthday card is especially moving and most telling in moving the family’s story forward.

There are scenes of confusion as Draper Doyle confronts his emerging sexuality, his long and zany “psychooralysis” sessions with Uncle Reg and his difficult struggle to live outside the long held reputation of the Ryan family in St John’s. His love of hockey and especially the fate of his favorite team, Montreal’s Les Canadiens, appears to be his only refuge, the only time when he feels a sense of happiness.

Draper Doyle gradually pieces together the mystery of why his father died and eventually helps his mother and sister leave the Ryan home and begin a life of their own. During their stay with Aunt Phil, Draper Doyle recounts a number of memorable scenes including a Christmas pageant in which he is a member of the choir but doesn’t actually sing, a one on one hockey duel with his sister Mary, a hilarious encounter with a sales clerk at Woolworth’s where he goes to buy underwear and a dreaded boxing match with the boys from the local orphanage. These scenes are funny and so well written they stay in the reader’s memory long after the book is finished.

Johnson has created some rich characters for this novel and Aunt Phil is one of the best. He also explores the notion of family, a group that provides support but is also fraught with power struggles, old grievances and misunderstandings. Throughout the narrative, Draper Doyle has an honest and compelling voice. He is a young boy who lets readers know what it was like to grow up Catholic in St John’s during the fifties and sixties and who refuses to comply with his extended family’s determination to hide the truth behind his father’s death.

I have always enjoyed Johnston’s work and I am one of those who simply loved this novel. But I can also understand those who find it too unconventional for their taste. I think those who have visited Newfoundland or understand its very different culture as well as those who know and appreciate Johnston’s work, will enjoy this book as much as I did.

[Tom Axworthy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Divine Ryans is a 1990 novel by Wayne Johnston one of Canada's best and funniest novelists.The Ryans are divine because there are so many priests and nuns in the family and the novel does evoke a past age in Newfoundland and Canada as a whole where one's religion was a clear dividing line.Leaf versus Canadien hockey games on Saturday night take on the flavour of the Thirty Years War.Nine year old Draper Doyle Ryan has to come to terms with the death of his father when he and his mother and sister are forced to move in with their relatives. Aunt Phil is a terror but Uncle Reginald ,who refuses to go to church with the rest of the family, is a comic delight.The Ryans run a funeral home and Uncle Reginald's job is to drive the hearse.When Dapper's family finally says goodbye to him with the line " See you again", he replies " my record of not seeing passengers again is perfect ". Hockey is a theme running through the book as Draper has a puck from a Canadien Stanley cup victory passed on by his departed father( which plays a role in the surprise ending).Growing up in Winnipeg in the same 60s era as the book , I too cheered for the Canadiens when everyone else on the street was for the Leafs or Blackhawks. Johnston's interweaving of hockey with the Ryans and especially Drapper Doyle 's attempts to play goalie( his sister playing better than he does) evoked a host of memories and smiles. The Divine Ryans is a very comic (but moving too )description of the pains of adolescence .

[Gaelan D'costa · Rating 4 out of 5]

I thought this was a funny, stressful, and well-written tale about a child dealing with some deep (and from what I understand from the eastern Canadian people I know, fairly authentic-sounding) aspects of 60s Canadiana.

Doyle Draper is a pre-teen living in what I think is a maritimes part of Canada with his mother and sister. Their father has recently died, and their aunt, whose family effectively owns the street, has sold their house on behalf of the family business and forced them to move in with her.

The bulk of the story is them dealing with their incredibly Catholic and incredibly hypocritical family, in particular through the lense of Draper Doyle's journey through adolescence. His only support is an uncle who actively resists the family hypocracy, his sometimes-antagonistic-but-always-loving relationships with his mother and sister, and the emotional investment he has with the Montreal Canadians. His father sometimes shows up as a ghost too.

It took me only two reading sessions to get through this book, I found it a very easy, driven, and compelling read. As someone who also grew up Catholic (albeit not in a Canadian or European context) it seemed like a reasonably honest extrapolation of some experiences. I found the interleaving of tension and comedy of the story were very well done, and many of the more ineffable experiences in the book (particularly the beginning of Draper Doyle's sexual awareness and him recalling the trauma of his father's death were written with compelling imagery.

This felt like a very literary book, with a lot of imagery, a lot of references, and so on. I enjoyed the themes running through the book, even though its ribaldries are not normally something I go for.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

“The Divine Ryans”, one of Wayne Johnston’s earlier works, was recently re-released and I’m very glad it was. It is a wonderful, comic novel, set in St. John’s, Newfoundland, that delves into the complicated nature of family and the skeletons in the closet that often haunt them.

In this novel, young Draper Doyle Ryan wrestles with adolescence, the demands of his rather eccentric family and the sudden death of his father who lived under the shadow of a dark secret. Draper chafes under the strict reign of family matriarch Aunt Phil(omena) but finds refuge in his Uncle Reginald’s hilarious, “oralysis” talk therapy. The novel plays out against the backdrop of the iconic Montreal Canadians hockey team who become a religion in their own rite to the Ryan family.

“The Divine Ryans” is humorous, emotionally charged and tragic in equal measure skillfully weaving together the competing undercurrents that often define life.

[Bev · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of Wayne Johnston's early novels, set as usual in Newfoundland, is the story of young Draper Doyle Ryan and his experiences in the year following his father's death. He is one of the "Divine Ryans" of St John's, so named because a significant number of the family have become nuns and priests over the years. I loved the humour and gentleness with which his rather sad young life is recounted, and also his central passion -- the Montreal Canadiens and his own ineffectual career as a goalie who avoids being hit by pucks.

[Karen Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

Spoiler alert
Wonderful. Loved it but ... (if you are easily offended, don’t keep reading)
Why do so many books and movies dive straight into butt sex when revealing a characters hidden homosexuality. The dad is discovered by his little boy in the throes of butt sex. What can’t he have discovered them kissing or holding one another or making out or something else that gives up the character’s secret. Nope! Straight to the butt sex as if it is all gay men do. Not a fan of that in movies and lit.

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A solid 3 book, with an ending that brings it closer to a 4. The lack of forward plot movement and annoying puns keep it at a 3 for me. I enjoyed the writing, the character development and found it engrossing as it neared the ending, but I often wondered if the book was just going to be a series of things that happen to poor Draper Doyle or if there was a point to the book.

[Ericm · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is perhaps my favourite Johnston book. wickedly funny, great characters set in downtown St. John's. The stories about saturday night hockey games brought back a lot of memories. highly recommended.

[Gregg Norman · Rating 3 out of 5]

While I have enjoyed several of his other novels (and this one was, like the others, well written), The Divine Ryans was, I thought, excessively purient and overstuffed with truly unlikable characters.

[Candice Walsh · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a departure from his other books! I really enjoyed this, although the dream sequences and the hockey stuff was a bit much. Laugh out loud funny.

[Sharon Johnson · Rating 2 out of 5]

The last 10 pages almost earned it 3*

[Rennie · Rating 3 out of 5]

It had some great moments and you could not help but like Draper Doyle.

[Carol · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. Lots of laughs. A bit repetitive in the middle. Ending a bit surprising but did not engage me.

[Jean · Rating 3 out of 5]

When you’ve completed the book. Watch the movie (free) on line as I did.
It too is “ divine “.

[Laurie · Rating 2 out of 5]

read for a book club, not my favorite

[Sue Cohlmeyer]

Some funny scenes and dialogue but overall not an interesting read. The characters were not people that I could relate to.

[Robin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This funny, quirky, charming book made me laugh out loud most of the way through.

[Tarah Jakubiak · Rating 2 out of 5]

A book written about a child's struggles with religion , hockey and nightmares. I do not recommend.

[Shug · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love books abut Newfoundland written by Newfoundlanders. They capture the characters and their true voices without mockery or condescension.

[Sandy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some really funny parts but also quite sad. I’d give this a 3.5