Tara Johnson
Her Journey From Music to Page and Beyond By KayleighAnne E. Stanton
“If you were to walk down a street and ask ten different families about their political opinions in 1860, you would likely get ten different answers. It’s the same today. People may vote along basic two-party lines but there is much diversity and pockets of opinion within each one. The whole system is messy.” The realities of our world today have only reinforced the truth Tara Johnson, a civil war author veteran, already knows to be true. “I often hear the phrase ‘history repeats itself’ but I think a more accurate sentence might be ‘Human nature repeats itself.’” The civil unrest and division in our society today have only made it clearer. “We are broken people in need of a mighty, redeeming God.” Thankfully, we have that mighty, redeeming God, a truth that Tara Johnson highlights in her novels. Her first novel, Engraved on the Heart, covered the topics of the underground railroad, while Where Dandelion Blooms, her sophomore novel, goes into the story
of a female joining the army. Her 2021 release, All Through the Night, takes on darker tones; digging deep into racism and hatred in a somewhat terrifying way-- the predecessor of the KKK. “I had no idea this secret society was so large…or so incredibly evil,” she told me. “I endured many nightmares after days of reading the horrors they inflicted on their victims.” Yet she endured the nightmares and the research to bring this terrific and much-needed novel into the world. It couldn’t have come at a better time, and perhaps it was Providence that led her here. After all, her journey with words didn’t start with bound pages. Before writing, Tara Johnson shared her voice with the world through music. For years, she was with a Christian record label, sharing the gospel and Jesus’ love through song. And then she was diagnosed
