Books with author J.P. Johnston

Advance Praise for The Hat“Wonderful story! Sure to be a favorite of all who read it.” – Hugh R. MacDonald, author of Trapper Boy and Us and Them“It’s a great novel that should be translated into French.” Claude DeGrâce, Managing Director, Société Promotion Grand-Pré."It's a wonderful book ... which reminds us that the majority of the people deported were children. This book will be enjoyed by both children and adults; it palpably makes one feel the horror and helplessness felt by the victims. Maddeningly for the boy, no one—not even his loving grandfather—could prevent the Deportation." Warren Perrin, Louisiana lawyer and champion of Cajun history and Acadiana A. J. B. Johnston holds the reader close in this moving novel about the Acadian Deportation from Grand-Pré in 1755. The main characters, Marie and Charles, are fictional, but the story is based on well-documented historical facts. "The Hat" is a fresh, 21st-century interpretation that is both poignant and filled with suspense. The story begins on a gusty August morning, when 14-year old Marie and her 10-year old brother Charles spot sails on the horizon. Not long after, foreign soldiers enter their village. Day by day, Charles and Marie—and everyone else in the village—live with building suspense. They watch with bewilderment, then deepening concern, as men-at-arms from another land take over the local church and build a fort. What is going on? With each passing day, the complications and troubles mount. Everything in the village is upended. Marie and Charles are only kids, but they have to find ways to deal with the difficult situations in which they find themselves. They have to be wise and brave beyond their years. A. J. B. Johnston is an award-winning Canadian historian and novelist. For his books on French colonial history in Atlantic Canada, France made him a chevalier of its Ordre des Palmes Académiques. His first foray into fiction was the Thomas Pichon Novels, which explore ambition, longing and betrayal in 18th-century France and England. His website is ajbjohnston.com. On Facebook he is at A J B Johnston, Writer. He also posts on Instagram.

Listen! For the song of Owen Thorskard has a second verse. Every dragon slayer owes the Oil Watch a period of service, and young Owen was no exception. What made him different was that he did not enlist alone. His two closest friends stood with him shoulder to shoulder. Steeled by success and hope, the three were confident in their plan. And though Siobhan McQuaid was the first bard in a generation, she managed to forge a role for herself and herald Owen as a new kind of dragon slayer for a new kind of future. But the arc of history is long and hardened by dragon fire. Try as they might, Owen and his friends could not twist it to their will. Not all the way. Not all together. Listen! I am Siobhan McQuaid. I know the cost of even a small bend in the course of history. Listen!

This hilarious retelling of The Princess and the Pea with a Wild West twist is perfect for a read-aloud!Farethee Well is a woman of strong mind and bodacious beauty, but when suitors come to ask for her hand in marriage, can she tell a real cowboy from a fake? “This excellent retelling of Andersen’s The Princess and the Pea . . . is by far the most original to come along in the past few years.”—School Library Journal “Johnston’s clever parody is rich with the language and details of the Wild West. Ludwig’s colorful illustrations heighten the story’s exaggerated humor . . . A great choice for a read-aloud.”—Booklist

"The most powerful stories encompass a paradox. Spindle is both mythic and true, old beyond reckoning and dazzlingly, gloriously new. You've known this story all your life; you have never heard its like before. The Storyteller Queen lives, and her name is E. K. Johnston." —Rachel Hartman, New York Times best-selling author of Seraphina The world is made safe by a woman...but it is a very big world. It has been generations since the Storyteller Queen drove the demon out of her husband and saved her country from fire and blood. Her family has prospered beyond the borders of their village, and two new kingdoms have sprouted on either side of the mountains where the demons are kept prisoner by bright iron, and by the creatures the Storyteller Queen made to keep them contained. But the prison is crumbling. Through years of careful manipulation, a demon has regained her power. She has made one kingdom strong and brought the other to its knees, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. When a princess is born, the demon is ready with the final blow: a curse that will cost the princess her very soul, or force her to destroy her own people to save her life. The threads of magic are tightly spun, binding princess and exiled spinners into a desperate plot to break the curse before the demon can become a queen of men. But the web of power is dangerously tangled--and they may not see the true pattern until it is unspooled.

Dragons terrorize modern day North America in this brilliant follow-up to the critically acclaimed Story of Owen.Seventeen-year-old dragon slayer Owen and his bard, Siobhan, are set to join the Oil Watch, the international organization charged with protecting the world from the vicious, carbon emission-eating creatures. Owen is destined by birth to carry on his family's heroic legacy, but what makes him different is that he doesn't enlist alone. His two closest friends stand with him shoulder to shoulder. Steeled by success and hope, the three are confident in their plan. Still, try as they might, Owen and his friends may not make it. Not all the way. Not all together.Readers who love alternate history will devour this quirky, clever tale of friendship, sacrifice, and adventure.