Speaker 1: Campsite Media.
Speaker 2: When Roger's book Go Boy was released into the world
Speaker 2: in April of nineteen seventy eight, it was a time
Speaker 2: for celebration, and on this most unlikely of publication days,
Speaker 2: our newly minted author, Roger Karan, spent the day at Disneyland,
Speaker 2: well not the real Disneyland, but rather Colin's Bay, a
Speaker 2: prison in Kingston.
Speaker 3: They called Colin's Bay Penitentiary Disneyland because when you look
Speaker 3: at it from the distance of a mile, it looks
Speaker 3: like a disney Land.
Speaker 2: Roger and his beloved typewriter had been transferred to the
Speaker 2: relative comfort of medium security in Colin's Bay, and he
Speaker 2: was elated by the thought that he wouldn't be here
Speaker 2: much longer. His mandatory release date was still five years
Speaker 2: in the future, but hoped that as soon as he
Speaker 2: found himself in front of the parole board any month
Speaker 2: now as as soon to be best selling author of
Speaker 2: a soon to be well reviewed book, they'd set him
Speaker 2: free on the spot. That was his dream. Anyway, On
Speaker 2: his publication day, I don't imagine many couriers arrive at
Speaker 2: Collins Bay Penitentiary to deliver a box of books from
Speaker 2: a prestigious publisher to the author. But that's just what happened,
Speaker 2: and Roger was keen to start moving copies.
Speaker 4: And he'd be very quick on calling you and say, okay,
Speaker 4: it's out, now you can get it.
Speaker 2: He called his sister Sue, talking even faster than usual.
Speaker 4: Go to this store, call this store. He would make
Speaker 4: them ship me some and I said, well, I'll call
Speaker 4: you as soon as I get it.
Speaker 2: The publisher had done a good job drumming up interest
Speaker 2: ahead of its release. In the months leading up to
Speaker 2: pub day. Go Boy was blurbed and excerpted in just
Speaker 2: about every major newspaper in the country. They were getting
Speaker 2: behind it because it was a story that made for
Speaker 2: a good press release. They seemed genuinely to believe in
Speaker 2: the power of Roger's story, and they needed it to
Speaker 2: make enough money so that they wouldn't regret paying Roger
Speaker 2: in advance for book number two. Since his original manuscript
Speaker 2: had ballooned to over a thousand pages, his editors and
Speaker 2: publisher must have thought it wise to try to get
Speaker 2: a second book out of it, and it was a
Speaker 2: no brainer when they honed in on the Kingston Riot section.
Speaker 2: There's great public interest still lingering from the riot, and
Speaker 2: Roger promised to deliver a unique point of view to
Speaker 2: a story that no one else could offer. He's going
Speaker 2: to call the book Bingo, which is prison slang for
Speaker 2: a riot. So as the publisher would be keenly watching
Speaker 2: the sales figures of Go Boy, Roger would be judging
Speaker 2: it success by a different metric. Could this book earn
Speaker 2: him his freedom? From iHeart podcasts and campsite media. I'm
Speaker 2: Sam Mullens and this is Go Boys Episode seven, The
Speaker 2: Golden Boy of Rehabilitation. Roger had been getting little tastes
Speaker 2: of freedom in the form of pre release, and every
Speaker 2: hour he spent outside the prison walls was exquisite.
Speaker 5: Every twelve days they released me into the community for
Speaker 5: seventy two hours on a very strict structured conditions.
Speaker 2: On these three day stints, he traveled to Hull, Quebec,
Speaker 2: where there was a halfway house in the three story Victorian.
Speaker 5: I have to work eight hours a day in a
Speaker 5: government sponsored shop operated by ex inmates and sociologists and parole.
Speaker 1: Officers and all that you know.
Speaker 5: And then I finished work at four o'clock.
Speaker 2: And then after work I can.
Speaker 5: Go out into the city from five o'clock to midnight,
Speaker 5: but I have to be back at it exactly and
Speaker 5: precisely midnight. They're very strict about that, or I turned
Speaker 5: into a punk. And like Cinderoai, the.
Speaker 2: Stories I've told you about Roger in the series focus
Speaker 2: a lot on his escapes and his brief times on
Speaker 2: the outside. But by the time his book came out
Speaker 2: in nineteen seventy eight, he was forty years old and
Speaker 2: in the sum of his entire adult life, he'd been
Speaker 2: free for only sixteen months, and he'd just been in
Speaker 2: for the longest stint of his life. So now on
Speaker 2: the outside, the world burned brilliant and knew. At the
Speaker 2: Halfway House, they made him a soup that had broccoli
Speaker 2: in it. He'd never had broccoli before. He'd never tried
Speaker 2: wine or heard of a credit card, and even though
Speaker 2: it was the late seventies, he didn't have the slightest
Speaker 2: idea what Dia was. There's a lot to catch up on,
Speaker 2: like how to use a bank properly. For the first
Speaker 2: time in his life, he had money coming in, but
Speaker 2: it really messed with a sense of self. Roger wrote,
Speaker 2: it was hard to walk into a bank to make
Speaker 2: a deposit instead of a hasty withdrawal. He had to
Speaker 2: take things slow. Roger spent a lot of time in
Speaker 2: the shopping mall near his halfway house, in part because
Speaker 2: it offered a stark of contrast to the prison life
Speaker 2: he could find. He'd ride the escalators and drink in
Speaker 2: all the smells, all the colors of the displays, a
Speaker 2: far cry from the gray walls he was on loan from.
Speaker 2: And most novel of all was the simple pleasure of
Speaker 2: hearing women and children's voices, sounds he'd grown completely unaccustomed to.
Speaker 2: When the three days would be up, Roger head back
Speaker 2: early to Colin's Bay, ensuring that he gave him self
Speaker 2: extra time. He knew that if he reported to the
Speaker 2: gate even one second late, he'd be in violation of
Speaker 2: his parole. And also he liked to make sure he
Speaker 2: had enough time to get some McDonald's.
Speaker 3: So the taxi would put into McDonald's and I'd order
Speaker 3: being back, and the girls got to know me after
Speaker 3: six months of every two weeks that go there, and
Speaker 3: they hurry up, give me my big mac in my
Speaker 3: frain fries and melt shake.
Speaker 2: Noing, it doesn't, don't.
Speaker 6: I'm standing and booking the window to penitentiary and gun tiredly.
Speaker 6: Oh God, I gotta go back there, you know. And
Speaker 6: for twenty four years I was a goat boy in miscaping,
Speaker 6: and I was always running away from the place, saying
Speaker 6: here I am in a hurry to get back.
Speaker 2: When time was up, Roger would always buzz back in
Speaker 2: with an extra burger or two in his pockets and
Speaker 2: an extra story or two for his buddies on the range. Eventually,
Speaker 2: Roger was finally allowed to move into the Halfway House
Speaker 2: full time, and like that his home address no longer
Speaker 2: had the word penitentiary in it. His book seem to
Speaker 2: have made a difference. The day Roger got out, he
Speaker 2: was greeted on the other side of the gate by
Speaker 2: a gaggle of smiling reporters, all anxious to get cracking
Speaker 2: on their feel good pieces about the inmate author who
Speaker 2: was being released ahead of schedule. He was still looking
Speaker 2: down the barrel of nine more years of parole, but
Speaker 2: he was thrilled to be living in the whole Halfway
Speaker 2: House more permanently, where he didn't even have to work
Speaker 2: in the upholstery shop anymore. Instead, he would remain as
Speaker 2: his typewriter in his room that Nodawa Citizen reporter described
Speaker 2: like this.
Speaker 7: It's small, but he has it fixed up as a
Speaker 7: compulsively neat teenager. Mit kmart. Rugs are tacked up as
Speaker 7: improvised doors on the clothes closet, jackets, shirts, shoes and
Speaker 7: pants are placed with military precision. There's a desk, a chair,
Speaker 7: a narrow bed and very dim lighting. Karen can't stand
Speaker 7: bright lights. They remind him of prisons where nothing is
Speaker 7: in shadow.
Speaker 2: One of the conditions of his parole was that he
Speaker 2: wasn't allowed to buy anything over two hundred dollars without permission.
Speaker 2: But luckily he was able to pick up a tape
Speaker 2: player for his room, update his wardrobe a little bit,
Speaker 2: and get a bicycle to zip around the neighborhood. On
Speaker 2: April nineteen seventy nine marked one year since the book
Speaker 2: Go Boy had come out. It was also the month
Speaker 2: that Roger became a known name. One day, someone called
Speaker 2: him on the Halfway House community line.
Speaker 8: I got a phone call a week ago Thursday morning
Speaker 8: from the Canada Console and this gentleman, mister Renoga, got
Speaker 8: on the phone and he says, you just won as
Speaker 8: soul matter of factory, you just won the government General's
Speaker 8: Award for the Best Book of nineteen seventy eight.
Speaker 2: The Governor General Awards are among Canada's most prestigious prizes
Speaker 2: for creativity. All of your favorite Canadians have one, Joni Mitchell,
Speaker 2: Sandra O, Ryan Reynolds, and of course our literary giants
Speaker 2: like Margaret Atwood and Michael and Datci. And in nineteen
Speaker 2: seventy eight, the award for nonfiction went to our man
Speaker 2: in the Halfway House. The guy from the council said
Speaker 2: to keep this news between them, so Roger would have
Speaker 2: to keep it under his hat until the official announcement
Speaker 2: one week later.
Speaker 9: After the call, I ran back downstairs in the halfway
Speaker 9: house I was living in and said excitedly to all
Speaker 9: the guys in maw our housekeeper, you'll never guess what's happened.
Speaker 2: What they all asked.
Speaker 9: I can't tell you for another week, but it's fantastic, unbelievable.
Speaker 9: I called my siblings and told them the same thing.
Speaker 4: Roger calls me and he was talking double time. He
Speaker 4: was so excited on the phone. I knew he hadn't
Speaker 4: the bank because he'd never call him tell me that,
Speaker 4: so I knew something happened.
Speaker 2: What followed this life changing news for Roger was a
Speaker 2: week of sheer pain. Roger was built to endure the
Speaker 2: worst things, to withstand unfathomable punishment and suffering. But good news,
Speaker 2: great news that sent him spiral. He went to visit
Speaker 2: his sister that week, and she could tell as soon
Speaker 2: as he walked in that something was wrong. He tried
Speaker 2: to put on a happy face, but it was obvious
Speaker 2: as he was wrestling with his nephews that he was preoccupied.
Speaker 2: He was consumed by the thought that he was being tricked,
Speaker 2: that someone was going to pull the rug out from
Speaker 2: under him. Surely, someone in a tweed jacket somewhere would
Speaker 2: catch wind of the council's plan to reward a criminal
Speaker 2: and kibosh it. Surely, like every big score he'd ever
Speaker 2: been close to grasping, this too, was going to end
Speaker 2: in disaster, but he couldn't deny it. Winning this award
Speaker 2: would be a definitive victory in his life, and he
Speaker 2: wanted it bad and then mercifully. A few days later,
Speaker 2: Roger was scooped by the Ottawa Citizen, who announced in
Speaker 2: print that Roger was an official recipient of the illustrious
Speaker 2: Governor General's award right away. He called David Schleike, his
Speaker 2: friend who'd been with him since go Boys' first draft.
Speaker 10: The day I heard that he was the winner was
Speaker 10: from Roger. He called me and said, I got it.
Speaker 10: I got it, I got it, And he said I
Speaker 10: got ten thousand dollars. I said, they give you ten
Speaker 10: thousand dollars. They're going to let you keep ten thousand dollars.
Speaker 10: Because he was still in the halfway house at the
Speaker 10: time up in Hull, and he was extraordinary excited.
Speaker 11: He wanted to buy a car right away.
Speaker 4: The amount of money you would get that was going
Speaker 4: to help him out, and he was very He was
Speaker 4: very excited, and you're going to come and I said, oh, yes,
Speaker 4: I'm going to come.
Speaker 3: He invite me to the Governor General's bench. He said,
Speaker 3: we're throwing a party in your honor and the Governor
Speaker 3: General is going to be there in all the big week.
Speaker 10: And he was looking forward to it. But he said,
Speaker 10: I only have one suit, and should I get another suit?
Speaker 10: And do you think I look good and darker? And
Speaker 10: should I wear a tie?
Speaker 11: That kind of thing.
Speaker 10: He was very aware of being in the public eye
Speaker 10: and it was on his mind.
Speaker 2: The big night was held at Rideau Hall, the Governor
Speaker 2: General's residence in Ottawa. Roger remembers he was allowed to
Speaker 2: bring up to seven guests, but for Roger, seven guests
Speaker 2: wasn't going to cut it. I went there with twenty
Speaker 2: one guests. Twenty one guests, and I.
Speaker 6: Refused to go.
Speaker 3: I put invite three parole officers.
Speaker 12: The lady did the cook as a halfway house two
Speaker 12: x times. With helped me get out to the cole
Speaker 12: or Bernie my sister two.
Speaker 6: Brodriend O Ganiel drove up the Governor General's nation.
Speaker 2: After all his sartorial freddys, Roger ended up going with
Speaker 2: an outfit that held a special significance to him. He
Speaker 2: wore his prison suit, the suit the Institution gave him
Speaker 2: upon his release, because.
Speaker 11: It looks so different from everybody else.
Speaker 5: Ever, he's saying, you, you look great, You look great.
Speaker 11: Where'd you get your suit?
Speaker 1: Is sprom Colin's babe.
Speaker 2: As they mingled ahead of the ceremony in the opulent
Speaker 2: tent room, Roger, who almost never drank, allowed himself a
Speaker 2: couple glasses of wine to steady himself in what must
Speaker 2: have felt like the most surreal of dreams. In the
Speaker 2: footage of Roger's big moment, he seems so remarkably grounded.
Speaker 2: Often when cameras are pointed at him, he seems wound
Speaker 2: up like a spring, like he's about to jump the
Speaker 2: fence and run away from the attention. But in this moment,
Speaker 2: as the Governor General presents him with a specially bound
Speaker 2: copy of his book with a red cover, you can
Speaker 2: see that he wants to stay here forever. He clutches
Speaker 2: the book to his heart as he lets the applause
Speaker 2: wash over him. The camera then pans to Roger's entourage,
Speaker 2: where his sister Sue is taking polaroids and is looking
Speaker 2: at her brother with such pride it makes my eyes
Speaker 2: misty every time I watch it. When Roger got his
Speaker 2: original advance on his book, he used it to buy
Speaker 2: gifts for his family, and when he got his big award,
Speaker 2: he handed it to his sister for safe keeping.
Speaker 3: I've won the prize I gave to my sister.
Speaker 13: She took it.
Speaker 6: Almost got all my books on the shovel and flanks,
Speaker 6: and English and British and and some of the tokens.
Speaker 3: Of having support is the most important making in the world.
Speaker 4: It was like he was proud to make his family
Speaker 4: proud like I've done this, you know, and so it's
Speaker 4: something no one can ever take away from him. It
Speaker 4: was a proud day. It was riti. It was a good,
Speaker 4: good day.
Speaker 2: Beyond the accolade, Roger saw this recognition as a piecemate
Speaker 2: making opportunity between him and the country and society that
Speaker 2: had cast him away as a teenager.
Speaker 12: If Governor jenner Is Award represented the Canadian public, and
Speaker 12: the Canadian public saying me, Roger, for twenty five years,
Speaker 12: you did a lot of things to us, and for
Speaker 12: twenty five years we did a lot of things to you.
Speaker 3: Now we're scratched.
Speaker 12: Now where this is your homecoming party, make the visit.
Speaker 2: Roger was the feel good story of the night, end
Speaker 2: of the year in Canadian publishing, and in the aftermath,
Speaker 2: everyone wanted to talk to him. Everyone wanted to hear
Speaker 2: how that second book was coming along, and he was
Speaker 2: more than willing to share his happy moment with the world.
Speaker 5: I feel good in my flesh for the first time
Speaker 5: in my life. I don't have no hang ups, I
Speaker 5: got nothing to prove.
Speaker 13: I just feel so durn.
Speaker 5: Good and being able to wake up in.
Speaker 14: The outside world in the morning, it is so fantastic.
Speaker 2: Almost overnight, in TV, radio and print, Suddenly Roger's name
Speaker 2: was everywhere. Sue had seen her brother's photo in newspapers
Speaker 2: many times before, so it took some adjustment to get
Speaker 2: used to seeing articles about him that didn't include a mugshot.
Speaker 4: Now he was also hit in the headlines. But this
Speaker 4: was good stuff, and he liked the headlines.
Speaker 2: Roger was saying yes to everything. In the two years
Speaker 2: following his big win, he did over one hundred and
Speaker 2: fifteen interviews and was written about in two hundred articles.
Speaker 2: If you were in Canada, you couldn't miss.
Speaker 11: Him, and he was instantly a celebrity.
Speaker 4: You go from not being out there in yourself and
Speaker 4: then all of a sudden, you're like Hollywood. So, I mean,
Speaker 4: how somebody can even adapt to that is unbelievable. I
Speaker 4: don't know how he sanely came out of all that.
Speaker 10: So he was very excited about being a celebrity. He
Speaker 10: was very excited about having an identity.
Speaker 2: And with the fame, Roger suddenly had lots of money
Speaker 2: coming in from different places. His book Go Boy sold
Speaker 2: hundreds of thousands of copies. He got a nice advance
Speaker 2: to write book number two, and he not only sold
Speaker 2: the movie rights to his book for a tidy sum,
Speaker 2: but it was going to be the biggest budget film
Speaker 2: in Canadian history. These were Roger's salad days.
Speaker 10: He was very excited about having money and having freedom
Speaker 10: of movement.
Speaker 14: Roger is just starting to enjoy the things that were
Speaker 14: kept from him for so long. He recently bought a
Speaker 14: new Pontiac Firebird, which he affectionately calls his muscle car.
Speaker 2: Obviously, yes, Roger went with the Firebird.
Speaker 14: His apartment is full of electronic hardware some of us
Speaker 14: might never see, like the home videotape recorder used to
Speaker 14: record the interview shows he appears on, or the high
Speaker 14: priced stereo cassette deck.
Speaker 2: But perhaps the most meaningful opportunity that came Rogers way
Speaker 2: was when he was offered a long term gig from
Speaker 2: the most surprising of places. He was approached by the
Speaker 2: Solicitor General's office about the possibility of doing paid public
Speaker 2: speaking gigs. The Solicitor General is in charge of overseeing
Speaker 2: public safety corrections and policing, and they saw a great
Speaker 2: opportunity with Roger to use his story to engage with
Speaker 2: the public about the rehabilitative challenges and successes available to
Speaker 2: Canadian inmates. Basically, the same government that had tortured him
Speaker 2: for decades was paying him handsomely to speak on their behalf.
Speaker 2: They were giving him between five hundred and twenty five
Speaker 2: hundred dollars a speech to speak to high schools and
Speaker 2: university students, the John Howard Society, the Prison Arts Foundation.
Speaker 2: He'd even be paid to go and speak to law
Speaker 2: enforcement and rooms filled with corrections officers. His message about
Speaker 2: the flaws in the penitentiary system and the toxicity that
Speaker 2: exists between guard and inmate was an important one, and
Speaker 2: he was a great advocate for prisoner rights. Roger's friend
Speaker 2: David reminded him not to forget that the most powerful
Speaker 2: part of his story was about his journey as a writer.
Speaker 10: And I said to him, Roger, you got to talk
Speaker 10: to teachers, and that's an important audience for you because
Speaker 10: you embody the very thing we English teachers love, which
Speaker 10: is that literature and writing can really be useful in life.
Speaker 2: David obviously knew that Roger could write, but what he
Speaker 2: didn't understand until he watched Roger at one of these
Speaker 2: speaking gigs was that he was even better at telling
Speaker 2: his stories on stage, and.
Speaker 10: The Jellybean story just electrified them. I'm not being hyperbolic
Speaker 10: or exaggerating when I said there were a number of
Speaker 10: people there who wept, the teachers, they were really moved
Speaker 10: by that story. And Roger had that self conscious little
Speaker 10: bit of a laugh of his and he saw and
Speaker 10: felt that he could pick up the vibe from the room.
Speaker 10: And then when he was finished his story that included
Speaker 10: many of the anecdotes from Go Boy, that was a
Speaker 10: standing ovation.
Speaker 11: It was electrifieder. It was a powerful moment.
Speaker 2: Roger eventually was allowed to move out of the halfway
Speaker 2: house and into his own apartment. Well is more of
Speaker 2: a penthouse, a bonafide bachelor pad, filled with gadgets such
Speaker 2: as a wireless TV converter, and it featured a breathtaking
Speaker 2: view overlooking the canal. Roger loved to invite his family
Speaker 2: over to show it off. Here's his nephew Todd.
Speaker 15: He would be on the balcony and the building was
Speaker 15: almost directly across from the Prime Minister's residence in Sussex Street.
Speaker 2: Of the many new things that had emerged into Roger's life,
Speaker 2: perhaps the thing that brought him. The most joy was
Speaker 2: that he was finally able to fully and properly step
Speaker 2: into his role as an uncle.
Speaker 15: I knew him as the uncle who did well. He
Speaker 15: had come out of prison, he had written this incredible book,
Speaker 15: he had won a Governor General's award.
Speaker 11: I had nothing but pride for him.
Speaker 2: This was the golden age of being Uncle Roger.
Speaker 16: You could feel that he loved us.
Speaker 2: Here's his niece, Diane.
Speaker 16: You know it wasn't just fake it. You could feel
Speaker 16: a family thing. It was very, very art warming.
Speaker 15: He always wanted to play with the kids, wrestling, taking
Speaker 15: us fishing, going out for drives in his trans am.
Speaker 16: When I had children of my own, my boys, they'll
Speaker 16: remember him as that. They remember how strong he was
Speaker 16: and how much fun they had with him.
Speaker 15: You know, sometimes you have adults that don't pay attention
Speaker 15: to the kids. But he really was there and really
Speaker 15: wanted to interact with us a lot.
Speaker 11: So it was a ton of mine.
Speaker 2: Beside Roger's typewriter was an always tall stack of fan mail.
Speaker 2: On average, he'd get eight letters a day passed along
Speaker 2: from his publisher and his sister Sue remembers well. The
Speaker 2: general tenor of the correspondence.
Speaker 4: You had girls just throlling themselves at him. He was
Speaker 4: reading on a roller coaster ride there. You know that
Speaker 4: I wasn't thrilled about.
Speaker 11: He was pretty heavy in the dating scene.
Speaker 2: Roger writes about this period in his life in the
Speaker 2: forward of one of his books.
Speaker 9: The thing I missed the most while in prison was
Speaker 9: the exquisite pleasure of holding a woman in my arms.
Speaker 9: Upon my release, I made up for lost time, and
Speaker 9: on each occasion I felt like falling to my knees
Speaker 9: and thanking God for having created such a wonderful partner.
Speaker 10: He was doing lots of talks. He was very socially active.
Speaker 10: He loved dating lots of women.
Speaker 4: You know, I said, Roger, be careful. You know that
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 11: They just came out of the.
Speaker 2: We found lots of photos of Roger from these years
Speaker 2: with dozens and dozens of different women on his arm.
Speaker 2: And when you line them all up beside each other,
Speaker 2: it's obvious that Roger tended to attract a certain type babes.
Speaker 2: They're all babes. And it makes sense, doesn't it, Because
Speaker 2: what was Roger but essentially a fit, gentle bad boys
Speaker 2: star of the Canadian literary scene. Not a lot of
Speaker 2: those out there.
Speaker 4: And once his book even went to England girls sending
Speaker 4: money clothes their own clothes. I mean, like, what is.
Speaker 2: This Roger's life that had felt so empty for so
Speaker 2: long was now suddenly overflowing with attention and love and gigs.
Speaker 2: And it wasn't exactly the ideal set of circumstances for
Speaker 2: someone on a writing deadline. During this period, the worst
Speaker 2: thing an interviewer could ask him was how's that second
Speaker 2: book coming, Roger, a question people seemed to be asking
Speaker 2: more and more. The way that Roger would talk about
Speaker 2: writing changed around this time too. There were periods with
Speaker 2: his original manuscript where the work felt therapeutic and writing
Speaker 2: would fill him with purpose and joy.
Speaker 10: And then that started to erode, and so he depressed
Speaker 10: him that he was losing what he called his mojo.
Speaker 2: He wrote his first book trapped in a room with
Speaker 2: nothing but a pen and pencil and typewriter and time,
Speaker 2: and it still took him fifteen years to write book
Speaker 2: number one. But now he was supposed to make a
Speaker 2: deadline in this version of his life. Good luck. He
Speaker 2: started referring to his workspace as his torture chamber. And
Speaker 2: he described bingo as the noose around his neck. It
Speaker 2: took him every bit of willpower he had just to
Speaker 2: sit at the typewriter. Roger says in one inn that
Speaker 2: he can't even go to his workspace to answer the
Speaker 2: letters on the filing cabinet. That's my twilight zone, he says.
Speaker 2: His publisher would call him once a week to ask
Speaker 2: him the question that would flood his body with cortisol,
Speaker 2: how's bingo coming. He'd tell them that he was struggling,
Speaker 2: that he was blocked, and then he'd promised that the
Speaker 2: next week would be different. After he hung up, he'd
Speaker 2: rush out the door to take a long, fast bike
Speaker 2: ride to shed the shame of another week going by
Speaker 2: without having written a single word. He couldn't figure it out.
Speaker 2: It was as if some balance in his life that
Speaker 2: had helped him in the past was askew, and he
Speaker 2: began to develop a theory about what was missing.
Speaker 9: The lack of imminent danger and of the consequent gut
Speaker 9: eating fear that had once been my constant companions. Realizing
Speaker 9: that I had become addicted to fear, I cast around
Speaker 9: nervously for a legitimate substitute that would scare me without
Speaker 9: getting me into trouble.
Speaker 2: Basically, he needed to find a legal activity that would
Speaker 2: make him fear for his life.
Speaker 3: So I see you signing shopping glad, that says the
Speaker 3: Adventurers joined the Audibus sky Diamond Club. You don't pair shooting,
Speaker 3: you know, I said, pair shooting. I see. I'm gonna
Speaker 3: like you know it actoually be good.
Speaker 1: From when I found myself hurtening out of an airplane
Speaker 1: at one hundred and twenty miles an hour, you know,
Speaker 1: and doing the countdown and then shoot opening, and I
Speaker 1: never wanted to end.
Speaker 2: Roger's publisher kept calling to check.
Speaker 13: In, How was the book this week? Roger? Were you
Speaker 13: able to finish that chapter we were discussing? Okay, tell
Speaker 13: Roger to call us back when he has a moment.
Speaker 13: This is his publisher, all right, Roger. Tell you what
Speaker 13: for every one hundred typewritten pages you turn in, we'll
Speaker 13: give you an additional thousand dollars. How does that sound, Roger? Roger.
Speaker 2: Eventually, skydiving wasn't doing it for Roger anymore, so he
Speaker 2: needed to up the ante.
Speaker 9: I pursued this thrilling sport for almost two years, and
Speaker 9: when I gave it up. It was for flying school.
Speaker 9: I always landed the plane a little too steeply, thereby
Speaker 9: giving my instructors some anxious moments. I never did fully
Speaker 9: understand all the gadgets on the instrument panel, as I
Speaker 9: had almost no education.
Speaker 2: He says he likes it when the weather is rough.
Speaker 9: I only relax if it's violent and I'm scared. That's
Speaker 9: when I fly the best.
Speaker 2: In a TV interview from the early eighties, one of
Speaker 2: Roger's girlfriends is asked, is.
Speaker 11: He a happy Man's Roger a happy man?
Speaker 14: No?
Speaker 13: I don't think so.
Speaker 14: Like I mean, there's I'm not a firm believer of
Speaker 14: happiness in any way. I believe in joy, and I
Speaker 14: believe in peace, and I wouldn't say he has peace.
Speaker 2: Roger had ascended to such dizzying heights from where he began.
Speaker 2: But no matter how high you get in your plane,
Speaker 2: in your career, or in the pecking order, the ground
Speaker 2: is still there trying to pull you closer. Soon for Roger,
Speaker 2: his second book would be the least of his worries.
Speaker 4: And everybody's saying to me, didn't you hear about Roger?
Speaker 4: And I said, what, oh my, what happened?
Speaker 6: A few minutes earlier, a gunman wearing a Halloween mask
Speaker 6: robbed the store and briefly held a store for posta.
Speaker 15: I think Everybody's worst kind of materialized in my heart
Speaker 15: just sank.
Speaker 2: Go Boy is a production from Campside Media in partnership
Speaker 2: with iHeart Podcasts. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 2: or wherever you get your podcasts. Go Boy was written
Speaker 2: and hosted by me Sam Mullins. Our producer is Rob
Speaker 2: Lindsay of Paradox Pictures. Laine Rose is our senior producer.
Speaker 2: Sound design, mix and engineering by Garrett Tiedemant, original music
Speaker 2: by Garrett Tiedemant. Fact checking by Michael Kenyon Meyer. Selected
Speaker 2: archival clips are from CBC Licensing. The book Go Boy
Speaker 2: was written by Roger Kuran. iHeart Podcasts executive producers are
Speaker 2: Lindsay Hoffman and Jennifer Bassett. Excerpts from Roger Kuran's book
Speaker 2: Go Boy, read by Jamie Kavanaugh, Spencer Rose, Voice s
Speaker 2: Oard Ottawa Citizen Reporter. Campside Media's executive producers are Josh Dean, Vanessa, Gregoriatis,
Speaker 2: Adam Hoff and Matt Cher. A special thanks to our
Speaker 2: operations team, Doug Slaywyn, Ashley Warren, Sabina Marra, and Destiny Dingle.
Speaker 2: If you enjoyed Go Boy, please rate and review the
Speaker 2: show wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks for listening.