OFFICIAL WEBSITE OF QUENTIN CASEY
Journalist and Author
ABOUT
Quentin Casey holds a master’s degree in Maritime Canadian history from Dalhousie University and a master’s degree in journalism from Western University.
His reporting has appeared in the Financial Post, Canadian Business magazine, Reader’s Digest, and many other publications. He is the author of Joshua Slocum: The Captain Who Sailed Around the World, and The Sea Was in Their Blood: The Disappearance of the Miss Ally’s Five-Man Crew, which won an Atlantic Book Award for non-fiction in 2018.
His latest book, Net Worth: John Risley, Clearwater, and the Building of a Billion-Dollar Empire will be published in June 2023.
He lives in Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia, Canada.
Net Worth: John Risley, Clearwater, and the Building of a Billion-Dollar Empire
Coming June, 2023
The definitive biography of the man behind Clearwater by the award-winning author of The Sea Was in Their Blood.
John Risley is rich. Very rich. A university dropout who aspired, as a boy, to become a millionaire, Risley has evolved into one of Canada’s most dynamic, risk-taking entrepreneurs—the co-creator and visionary behind three global companies, and an investor in businesses spanning space technology, electric vehicles, and biofuels.
Though most often associated with Clearwater and the seafood sector (where his ideas transformed the Atlantic Canadian lobster industry into a multi-billion-dollar enterprise), John Risley acquired most of his wealth through unrelated businesses, including a huge gamble in Caribbean telecommunications.
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His name has also become synonymous with conspicuous consumption; he spends extravagantly on houses, superyachts, private jets, prized Canadian artwork, and charitable causes.
Drawing on extensive research and interviews with family, long-time friends, and key business partners, as well as more than a dozen interviews with Risley himself, award-winning author Quentin Casey details how Risley became wealthy: how he built his businesses and made his fortune—and the luxuries it has provided him.
Through expert storytelling and twenty black-and-white photos, Net Worth also explores the cost of amassing that wealth, and the personal price Risley has paid for his relentless pursuit of the next big deal.
Brendan Paddick, former CEO of Columbus Communications and long-time Clearwater board member
"John is one of those guys where if there’s a pile of manure, most people are looking at it thinking, 'Man, what a pile of shit.' And Risley’s there with a shovel [saying], ‘I know there's a pony in here somewhere.'"