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Fiction Historical

Thomas, A Secret Life

A Novel

by (author) A.J.B. Johnston

Publisher
Cape Breton University Press
Initial publish date
Nov 2012
Category
Historical, Biographical, General
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9781897009741
    Publish Date
    Aug 2012
    List Price
    $19.95
  • eBook

    ISBN
    9781897009895
    Publish Date
    Nov 2012
    List Price
    $9.99

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Recommended Age, Grade, and Reading Levels

  • Reading age: 16 to 18

Description

Writer, lover, spy: Life is nowhere near as good or as easy as Thomas Pichon imagined it would be. Set in early-18th-century France, Thomas: A Secret Life is the imagined life of Thomas Pichon. We first meet Thomas as a twelve-year old in the small town of Vire, Normandy. Precociously sensuous by nature, Thomas is inclined to poetry and religious/erotic imaginings. A series of adolescent adventures provide striking background to his character. Rejecting parental insistence that he become a priest, Thomas steals away to Paris in the middle of the night. There, nearly broke, Thomas works as a lowly office clerk, joins the ranks of aspiring French writers and makes extra money serving as a part-time spy for the police of Paris. But his careers advance too slowly for his liking, and he finds himself taking regular comfort and release in prostitutes’ stalls. A rendezvous with a high-class courtesan brings a new possibility and Thomas plots a future in which he can have his cake and eat it too.

About the author

A.J.B. Johnston has published more than a dozen books and hundreds of articles, a thirty-plus years career studying and writing about 18th-century French colonial history in Acadia. In recognition of his prolific career as a historian and writer, John was invested by France with the title Chevalier of the Ordre des Palmes Académiques (Order of Academic Palms). Johnston has now turned his hand to fiction. Long inspired to know more about Thomas Pichon (1700-1781), In his first novel, Thomas, A Secret Life (CBU Press, 2012), Johnston applied his considerable sense of 18th-century French history to imagine young Pichon’s early life in Normandy and Paris. For The Maze, Johnston did extensive research on 18th-century London.

A.J.B. Johnston's profile page

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