Granville Johnson, a two tour Viet Nam war veteran, is a life-long artist—a poet, short story writer, dancer, drummer, band leader (Autumn Rose), and multi-media creator. He is also an outspoken dementia advocate who has lived with the repercussions of a traumatic brain injury, vascular dementia and converted disorder, for years.

BACKSTORY
The Many Lives of Granville Johnson
By Granville Johnson

In this unforgettable memoir, author Granville Johnson recounts his roller-coaster life growing up in Chicago’s Westside ghetto in the 1950s and ’60s. Anchored by his mother’s love and his own ambition and self-assurance, Granville contends with constant trauma, including fluke accidents, illness, the death of loved ones, institutionalized racism, violent gangs, and repeated sexual assault.

While the legacy of that sexual assault becomes the one nemesis that Granville never fully defeats, he uses the pages of this inspiring book to remind others who have experienced similar assaults that what was done to them does not define them. Traumatic experiences definitely leave their mark, but as Granville so eloquently articulates, positive experiences and influences —like his mother—do as well.