Patternicity contains a suite of poems that won a 2008 CBC Literary Award and follows the author's debut book of poems, The Velocity of Escape (Guernica Editions, 2008). As a physiologist currently completing his Ph.D. at the University of Toronto, Johnstone's work is informed by a scientific approach, his own corporeal environment and an exploration of "the unreliability of language, regardless of how it's relayed."