Johnny Dixon is a fictional American boy featured in a series of twelve children's

gothic horror Gothic fiction, sometimes called Gothic horror in the 20th century, is a loose literary aesthetic of fear and haunting. The name is a reference to Gothic architecture of the European Middle Ages, which was characteristic of the settings of ea ...

novels, 1983 to 1999, written by

John Bellairs John Anthony Bellairs (January 17, 1938 – March 8, 1991) was an American author best known for his fantasy novel ''The Face in the Frost'' and many Gothic mystery novels for children featuring the characters Lewis Barnavelt, Rose Rita Pottin ...

or his successor

Brad Strickland William Bradley Strickland (born October 27, 1947) is an American writer known primarily for fantasy and science fiction. His speculative fiction is published under the name Brad Strickland except for one novel written as Will Bradley. By a wide ...

. In each book, 12-year-old Johnny and his group of friends face and overcome evil forces usually bent on ending the world.Clendineng, Sarah
"What's Happening @ Your Library: Halloween Reads"
''Fort Madison Daily Democrat'', October 24, 2007. Alternatively, Johnny Dixon is the book series ("Johnny Dixon and the Professor" in

ISFDB The Internet Speculative Fiction Database (ISFDB) is a database of bibliographic information on genres considered speculative fiction, including science fiction and related genres such as fantasy, alternate history, and horror fiction. The ISFDB ...

). The series is set in the early 1950s. Johnny lives with his paternal grandparents in fictional Duston Heights,

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut assachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ...

; his mother died of

cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...

some time prior to the beginning of the series, and his father is a fighter pilot in the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

during the

Korean War , date = {{Ubl, 25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953 (''de facto'')({{Age in years, months, weeks and days, month1=6, day1=25, year1=1950, month2=7, day2=27, year2=1953), 25 June 1950 – present (''de jure'')({{Age in years, months, weeks a ...

. Johnny's best friend, history professor Roderick Childermass, lives across the street. In "The Mummy, the Will and the Crypt", Johnny meets a boy his own age, Byron Q. "Fergie" Ferguson, at a Boy Scout camp. Thenceforth, Johnny, Fergie, and Professor Childermass (who is typically referred to as simply "the professor") are the three principal characters of the series.

Series bibliography

: One Johnny Dixon book was outlined by Bellairs and completed by Strickland.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dixon, Johnny Johnny Dixon Johnny Dixon Literary characters introduced in 1983 Child characters in literature Characters in children's literature Characters in American novels of the 20th century

Series bibliography

See also

References