I have just received a copy of Nigel Goodall’s new book about Johnny (my prize for winning Vicki’s Johnny & Winona contest), and humbly offer my little review for the fans.

When the mail man delivered the package from Mr. Goodall this morning, I immediately ripped off the paper and proceeded to do what I always do with new books: a "surface inspection" ( the look, feel, and even smell of a new book is part of the experience!! ).

First impression: Beautiful cover photo with an interesting type of print for Johnny’s name.

A slightly heavy feel to it. 253 pages with a great, fairly large and bold print on a nice and thick paper quality. 9 black & white photos and 8 color photos, sharp and most of them full-page.

I read through the book immediately, more or less without breaks, and I am left with a thoroughly good impression. I was immediately sympathetic to the author’s note in the beginning on the nature of writing a biography: "I would like to suggest that this work is my story of Johnny Depp. For me, it cannot be the story of Johnny Depp simply because there is no such thing. Any biography, or even autobiography, can only represent an editing of the facts, a selection of detail and an attempt to make sense of the various, changeable developments of someone’s real life". Mr. Goodall also makes a great effort to emphasize that Johnny, himself, was not involved in the book, and nowhere does he pretend to know Johnny personally, something I consider quite admirable when you compare with other writers.

The book is divided into 11 chapters with a short introduction and a filmography and list of awards and nominations in the back.

The first chapter deals with Donnie Brasco, but the subsequent chapters trace Johnny’s life and career in very consistent chronological order from his birth to the birth of his daughter ( yes, Mr. Goodall, actually managed to get that information in there - pretty impressive! ). The fact that such very recent information about Johnny is in the book, suggests that a certain amount of last minute editing must have taken place. The interesting thing is that the book doesn’t seem to have suffered because of this. One might have expected a relatively large number of mistakes, but I only noticed four typos: Edward D. Wood has become Edward J. Wood, Heather Langenkamp is referred to as Helen, Darlene Cates is called Gates and Colleen Atwood is called Colette. I consider this to be very minor mistakes in such a long narrative.

The only other book I have read on Johnny is Brian J. Robb’s book Johnny Depp - A Modern Rebel, and although it is packed with information, I found the chronology of that book extremely confusing, and it contained some rather resentful remarks ( not to mention the Mother of all Mistakes in a biography: printing a full-page photo on the very first page of someone who is quite clearly NOT Johnny!! I know I have mentioned this fact many times, but it still kills me ).

My impression of Mr. Goodall’s book is much more positive - the chapters seem much better structured, and the many quotes seem to be taken consistently in their context. There’s a general feeling of respect, and Mr. Goodall makes a great effort to note when statements are purely gossip.

The book contains concise descriptions of the background and production procedures on Johnny’s movies, as well as very good plot outlines and various critical opinions of Johnny’s performances.

And I think I located the answers to more or less all of the questions in Vicki’s Johnny and Winona contest!!!!

If there is anything missing from the book, it would be an index for future reference. It would have been an extra bonus to be able to look for particular movies, persons or events quickly, but other than that I found the book to be a purely enjoyable read.