fiction.wikisort.org - Writer

Emily Kate Johnston, who publishes as E.K. Johnston, is a Canadian novelist and forensic archaeologist.[2]

E. K. Johnston
Born	Emily Kate Johnston Huron East, Ontario, Canada[1]
Occupation	Novelist, forensic archaeologist
Language	English
Nationality	Canadian
Genre	Speculative fiction, young adult fiction
Notable works	A Thousand Nights Exit, Pursued by a Bear
Website
ekjohnston.ca

Career

Johnston started writing fan fiction in 2002, and wrote her first manuscript in 2009.[3] Her first book, The Story of Owen: Dragon Slayer of Trondheim, was published in 2014, and is set in an alternate present-day Ontario where dragons are both real and a menace. The review in The New York Times called the book "a clever first step in the career of a novelist who ... has many more songs to sing",[4] it was nominated for the William C. Morris Award in 2015.[2] A sequel, Prairie Fire, followed in 2015.

Johnston's third book was A Thousand Nights, a retelling of One Thousand and One Nights. C.S. Lewis's descriptions of the desert in The Horse and His Boy inspired Johnston in writing her own novel set in the desert.[5] A companion book, Spindle, followed in 2016, which was a reinterpretation of Sleeping Beauty.[6]

Her fifth novel, Exit, Pursued By A Bear, was published in 2016. Inspired by Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale, it tells the story of cheer-leading captain Hermione Winters, who discovers she is pregnant after being sexually assaulted at a camp party. It was written partially as a challenge, and partially as a response to Stephen Woodworth's 2013 bill to re-criminalise abortion.[7] It was named a "Book of the Year" by several organisations, including NPR,[8] Publishers Weekly,[9] and the New York Public Library.[10] It won the Canadian Children's Book Centre's Amy Mathers Teen Book Award in 2017.[11]

A Star Wars fan,[12] Johnston was asked to write a book on the character Ahsoka Tano. Published in October 2016,[13] Ahsoka fills in the gap between her appearances in The Clone Wars and Rebels. Her second Star Wars novel, Queen's Shadow, was released in March 2019.[14] Featuring Padme Amidala, Queen's Shadow is set in the years between the events of The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones.[15] Additionally, she has also written the story By Whatever Sun, focusing on Miara Larte, a character Johnston created within Ahsoka, and set during the events of A New Hope.

Johnston describes her novel That Inevitable Victorian Thing as a "Near-future Sci-fi Canadian Idealistic Romance".[16] It was published in 2017.

She credits her discipline in academic writing for helping her time management while writing prose; and states she is a fast writer – she wrote A Thousand Nights in "about 20 days",[3] and writes with little disturbance. She advises early and young writers to learn to finish projects as practice in self-discipline and editing.[7]

Her favourite authors are Jo Graham, Elizabeth Wein, Tessa Gratton, Kiersten White, Madeleine L'Engle, JRR Tolkien, David Eddings, CS Lewis,[3] and Holly Black.[2] She plays the alto saxophone and the clarinet.[2]

Johnston released another Star Wars novel, Queen's Peril, on June 2, 2020.[17]

Bibliography

Novels

• The Story of Owen: Dragon Slayer of Trondheim (2014)
• Prairie Fire (2015)
• A Thousand Nights (2015)
• Spindle (2016) – also published as Kingdom of Sleep
• Exit, Pursued By A Bear (2016)
• That Inevitable Victorian Thing (2017)
• The Afterward (2019)
• Aetherbound (2021)

Short stories

• Work In Progress (2017) in Three Sides of A Heart: Stories about Love Triangles, edited by Natalie Parker

Star Wars

• Ahsoka (2016)
• "By Whatever Sun" (2017), short story in From A Certain Point Of View
• Queen's Shadow (2019)
• Queen's Peril (2020)
• Queen's Hope (2022)

Dungeons & Dragons

• Honor Among Thieves: The Druid's Call (2022)

Awards

• 2015: William C. Morris Award, shortlist (The Story of Owen: Dragon Slayer of Trondheim)
• 2017: Amy Mathers Teen Book Award in 2017, winner (Exit, Pursued By A Bear)

References

External links

• E. K. Johnston at Library of Congress Authorities, with 12 catalogue records
• E. K. Johnston at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database

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