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LEARNING TO SPAR

$22.95

Raised in the shadow of the Pacific Northwest’s most notorious predators, Jill grew up knowing how easily girls could disappear. Ted Bundy, the Green River Killer—these names were part of the landscape, as were the near-misses: first a close call for Jill’s sister, and years later, one for Jill herself.

A chilling phone call from a stranger becomes the fracture point in Jill’s marriage—and the spark that leads her to a martial arts dojo. Training becomes a lifeline. So when a second predator targets her, it’s her instructor who steps between her and danger. Their bond deepens, they open a dojo together, and they fall in love. But as Liam’s mental health unravels, the man who once protected her becomes the one she must learn to survive.

Told through six sections—Run, Block, Fake, Parry, Strike, Accept—Learning to Spar mirrors the techniques Jill must master both on the mat and in life. With unflinching honesty, she navigates escalating threats, profound grief, and the deaths of three family members, including her father. Alongside the systemic forces of patriarchy she has battled her entire life, Jill also confronts the intimate, complicated relationship with her father as she reckons with a painful incident from childhood.

Both heart-pounding and deeply introspective, Learning to Spar exposes how our culture romanticizes predators and abandons the women they hunt. In the end, Jill’s story—of earning her black belt, reclaiming her agency, and refusing to be prey—becomes a testament to resilience, autonomy, and the power of fighting back.

Raised in the shadow of the Pacific Northwest’s most notorious predators, Jill grew up knowing how easily girls could disappear. Ted Bundy, the Green River Killer—these names were part of the landscape, as were the near-misses: first a close call for Jill’s sister, and years later, one for Jill herself.

A chilling phone call from a stranger becomes the fracture point in Jill’s marriage—and the spark that leads her to a martial arts dojo. Training becomes a lifeline. So when a second predator targets her, it’s her instructor who steps between her and danger. Their bond deepens, they open a dojo together, and they fall in love. But as Liam’s mental health unravels, the man who once protected her becomes the one she must learn to survive.

Told through six sections—Run, Block, Fake, Parry, Strike, Accept—Learning to Spar mirrors the techniques Jill must master both on the mat and in life. With unflinching honesty, she navigates escalating threats, profound grief, and the deaths of three family members, including her father. Alongside the systemic forces of patriarchy she has battled her entire life, Jill also confronts the intimate, complicated relationship with her father as she reckons with a painful incident from childhood.

Both heart-pounding and deeply introspective, Learning to Spar exposes how our culture romanticizes predators and abandons the women they hunt. In the end, Jill’s story—of earning her black belt, reclaiming her agency, and refusing to be prey—becomes a testament to resilience, autonomy, and the power of fighting back.

Praise for LEARNING TO SPAR

"In Learning to Spar, Jill McCabe Johnson tackles tough topics—violence against women, workplace equity, and the long arc of serial killers from the Pacific Northwest—and does not flinch. She is masterful at calling out her behaviors that might have exacerbated dangerous situations as well as subtly showing how the culture makes it difficult to rectify crimes against women. Her pacing and her continual ability to turn the mirror back on herself and ask, “How could I have done that?” puts Johnson up there with the best memoirists of our time—immediately establishing a voice the reader can’t help but trust. I’d follow that voice anywhere."

—Kate Carroll de Gutes, Objects In Mirror Are Closer Than They Appear, winner of the Oregon Book Award, the Lambda Literary Award, and the Indie’s First Award



"Jill McCabe Johnson's robust, compelling Learning to Spar is the tale of her martial arts teacher and eventual business partner to whom she says a couple yeses and a hundred no's. But it's more than a stalking survival guide. The dexterity of the prose—angry and measured, on-guard and reflective—reveals her strength as a writer, a mother, and a defender of her right to live free, during a decade's relentless ordeal. Despite few cops and courts hearing her pleas, she manages him with compassion, outsmarts his psychotic episodes, blocks his forceful returns as she builds a stronghold against a monster and a new life for herself."


—Thomas Larson, author of The Memoir and the Memoirist and The Sanctuary of Illness


"Learning to Spar moves with deliberate grace. In this book, Jill McCabe Johnson shows us that strength is not a single strike but a crafted arc of resilience."


—Karen Babine, author of The Allure of Elsewhere and All the Wild Hungers, winner of the Minnesota Book Award


"In her debut memoir, poet Jill McCabe Johnson learns to protect herself and her young son in a culture that persists in its indifference to violence against women. LEARNING TO SPAR is not just a testament to one woman's strength and determination to carry on; it’s a page-turner, too."


—Dinah Lenney, author of The Object Parade and Bigger than Life: A Murder, A Memoir

 

About JILL MCCABE JOHNSON

Jill McCabe Johnson is the author of four poetry collections and the memoir, Learning to Spar, forthcoming from Unsolicited Press, and editor of three anthologies. Honors include Nautilus Awards in Poetry and Nature Writing, Longreads' Best of 2021 Stories, eight Pushcart nominations, and support from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Artist Trust, and Hedgebrook. Jill is editor-in-chief of Wandering Aengus Press and its imprint, Trail to Table Press. She spends her free time writing, hiking, and in close observation of the natural world. https://jillmccabejohnson.com

 

  • Title: Learning to Spar

    Author: Jill McCabe Johnson

    Genre: Memoir

    ISBN: 978-1-969421-99-0

    Publication Date: DECEMBER 8, 2026