Pan Macmillan wins gold with Johnson-Thompson memoir
Pan Macmillan has acquired World Heptathlon Champion Katarina Johnson-Thompson’s “inspirational” memoir/manifesto. Ause Abdelhaq, Editor, will publish Unbroken, a series of lessons inspired by the life and career of Olympian Johnson-Thompson, in Hardback, Trade Paperback, eBook and Audio on November 14th 2024.
Johnson-Thompson is one of Britain’s most successful-ever athletes. After a breath-taking home Olympic debut at London 2012, she went on to become a multi-time World and Commonwealth Champion in heptathlon, as well as World and European Indoor Champion in pentathlon. She’s on track to represent Britain at the Olympics for a fourth time this summer in Paris, where she’s widely expected to compete for the medal places.
Johnson-Thompson is one of Britain’s most successful-ever athletes. After a breath-taking home Olympic debut at London 2012, she went on to become a multi-time World and Commonwealth Champion in heptathlon, as well as World and European Indoor Champion in pentathlon. She’s on track to represent Britain at the Olympics for a fourth time this summer in Paris, where she’s widely expected to compete for the medal places.
In Unbroken, she distils all the lessons she ’s learned from an extraordinary career, opening up about topics she’s never before discussed in public. From bursting on to the scene as a teenager and living with the expectations of becoming a national hero; to growing up mixed-race in Liverpool in the 1990s and being seen as a representative voice for Black Lives Matter; to coming so close to Olympic glory at Tokyo 2020, only to suffer a career-threatening injury in front of the world; Johnson-Thompson has faced and overcome setbacks at every stage, and has never, ever given up.
Ause Abdelhaq said, ‘Katarina is one of the most resilient people I’ve ever met. A champion in every sense of the word, I could not be prouder to be sharing her story with the public. I will always be tremendously grateful that she has chosen to trust me to bring it to life, because she’s a truly amazing human, and I cannot wait for people to read through the lessons that make her who she is.’
Katarina Johnson-Thompson said, ‘I’ve been approached to do a book many times over the years, but now feels like the right time. My road to success hasn’t always been a steady one; I’ve gone through many ups-and-downs, but I’ve learned from every experience. Unbroken is my chance to share those lessons with the world, and I couldn’t be more excited to be writing it.’
Katarina Johnson-Thompson is the reigning World Heptathlon Champion, a three-time Olympian and the current British record holder in both heptathlon and indoor pentathlon. Classed as Britain’s best-ever multi-eventer, she is a World, European and Commonwealth Games gold medalist across both disciplines. A proud Liverpudlian, she is also a patron for the Barrie Wells Trust, an Ambassador for the LFC Foundation, and the founder of the KJT Academy, which seeks to provide opportunities to state-schooled athletes from diverse ethnic communities in north-west England.