The Artificial Newfoundlander is a witty, playful, tale of contemporary St. John’s. Hugh Norman, a middle-aged English prof researching an eccentric novelist priest, is faced with the unexpected arrivals of his mysteriously unhappy daughter, her clueless husband, and an old flame ready for rekindling. Relationships morph, lines are crossed, and Hugh confronts some unpalatable but laugh-inducing dilemmas.

Larry Mathews was born in Montreal, grew up in Ottawa, and was educated at Carleton University (BA and MA) and the University of British Columbia (PhD). He taught at six Canadian universities before joining Memorial University’s English Department, where he taught until his retirement in 2015. In 1985 he taught the first creative writing course ever offered at Memorial, and he was the first co-ordinator of the creative writing program. His writing students include such now-published authors as Lisa Moore, Michael Winter, Claire Wilkshire, Aimee Wall, and Bridget Canning. His own academic specialization, originally William Blake, was contemporary Canadian and Newfoundland literature. He has published many articles on such writers as Alice Munro, David Adams Richards, Hugh Hood, Mavis Gallant, Norman Levine, and Keath Fraser. He has published about thirty stories in journals and anthologies, a collection of stories The Sandblasting Hall of Fame (Oberon, 2003), and two novels with Breakwater: The Artificial Newfoundlander (2010) and An Exile’s Perfect Letter (2018). He lives and writes in St. John’s with his wife, Claire Wilkshire.

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"From the tongue-in-cheek first line onward, Larry Mathews had me hooked. The Artificial Newfoundlander is a genuinely funny, thoroughly engaging story told with wit, lyricism, and a raucous narrative drive." -Samuel Thomas Martin, Dark Art Cafe (samuelthomasmartin.wordpress.com)

"This is all set in a blazingly contemporary St. John's, a city of films and cafes, art projects and bars, afternoon runs around Quidi Vidi lake and late nights walking uphill from Duckworth Street pubs... Mathews is the genuine article." -Joan Sullivan, The Telegram

"Mathews' sense of the absurdity of academic life is close on hilarious, and his take on the sometimes overblown St. John's art scene even funnier." -Jean Graham, The Northeast Avalon Times

“Larry Mathews is a searing and silver tongued wit. He writes with tuned precision and care, but he is offbeat and great fun to read. His juicy Newfoundland novel is a mystery of sorts, but there is another mystery hidden in its pages, whether a book can be barbed and satirical and yet lovingly lyrical at the same time. Is this feat possible? Mathews pulls it off with aplomb and I'm a fan.” - Mark Anthony Jarman, author of My White Planet and Ireland’s Eye

“A wry, funny, insightful, clever book.” -Wayne Johnston

"The novel engages with the deeper topics of place, family, and literature. It prompts us to consider not where a person is from in determining who they are, but how he relates to the important people in his life, and how he makes a place his home."

Jennifer Bowering Delisle, Newfoundland and Labrador Studies, Fall 2010

"Mathews' first novel provides an interesting and, at times, humorous account of the relationships of Professor Hugh Norman and his life in contemporary Newfoundland." -Clare O'Connor, Atlantic Books Today

"If you are a lover of Lisa More and a maniac for Michael Winter, like me, then The Artificial Newfoundlander is a treasure the likes of the Rosetta Stone. It's a zany and rowdy look at both our East Cost openness and the over-analytical English studies, all delivered with Richler-like cleverness." -Mike Landry, Telegraph-Journal