Jonathan Maberry

About Jonathan

Bio

JONATHAN MABERRY is a New York Times best-seller, five-time Bram Stoker Award-winner, anthology editor, comic book writer, executive producer, magazine feature writer, playwright, and writing teacher/lecturer. He is the editor of Weird Tales Magazine and president of the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers. He is the recipient of the Inkpot Award, three Scribe Awards, and was named one of the Today’s Top Ten Horror Writers. His books have been sold to more than thirty countries. He writes in several genres including thriller, horror, science fiction, epic fantasy, and mystery; and he writes for adults, middle grade, and young adult.

 

FICTION

Jonathan is the creator, editor and co-author of V-Wars, a shared-world vampire anthology from IDW Publishing that was adapted into a Netflix series starring Ian Somerhalder (Lost, Vampire Diaries).

His young adult fiction includes Rot & Ruin (2011; was named in Booklist’s Ten Best Horror Novels for Young Adults, an American Library Association Top Pick, a Bram Stoker and Pennsylvania Keystone to Reading winner; winner of several state Teen Book Awards including the Cricket, Nutmeg and MASL; winner of the Cybils Award, the Eva Perry Mock Printz medal, Dead Letter Best Novel Award, and four Melinda Awards); Dust & Decay (winner of the 2011 Bram Stoker Award; Flesh & Bone (winner of the Bram Stoker Award; 2012; and Fire & Ash (August 2013). Broken Lands, the first of a new spin-off series, debuted in 2018 and was followed by Lost Roads in fall 2020. Rot & Ruin is in development for film by Alcon Entertainment, and was adapted as a Webtoon (a serialized comic formatted for cell phones), becoming their #1 horror comic.

His novels include the enormously popular Joe Ledger series from St. Martin’s Griffin (Patient Zero, 2009, winner of the Black Quill and a Bram Stoker Award finalist for Best Novel) and eleven other volumes, most recently Relentless. His middle grade novel, The Nightsiders Book 1: The Orphan Army (Simon & Schuster) was named one the 100 Best Books for Children 2015. His standalone novels include Mars One, Glimpse, Ink, Ghostwalkers (based on the Deadlands RPG), X-Files Origins: Devil's Advocate, and The Wolfman--winner of the Scribe Award for Best Movie Adaptation

His horror novels include The Pine Deep Trilogy from Pinnacle Books (Ghost Road Blues, 2006, winner of the Bram Stoker Award for Best First Novel and named one of the 25 Best Horror Novels of the New Millennium; Dead Man's Song, 2007; and Bad Moon Rising, 2008), as well as Dead of Night, 2011 (named one of the 25 Best Horror Novels of the New Millennium) and its sequel, Fall of Night, 2014. 

His epic fantasy series, Kagen the Damned debuts in spring 2022. And he just signed to co-author (with Weston Ochse) a new series of military science fiction novels that launches the Sleepers series.

He is also the editor of three The X-Files anthologies; the dark fantasy anthology series, Out of Tune; Scary Out There, an anthology of horror for teens; and the anthologies Aliens: Bug Hunt, Nights of the Living Dead (with George Romero), Joe Ledger: Unstoppable  (with Bryan Thomas Schmidt); two volumes of mysteries: Alternate Sherlocks and The Game's Afoot (with Michael Ventrella); and Aliens vs Predator: Ultimate Prey (with Bryan Thomas Schmidt). He is also the editor of Don't Turn Out The Lights, the official tribute to Scary Stories to Tell In the Dark.

 

TV & FILM

Jonathan is the creator, editor and co-author of V-Wars, a shared-world vampire anthology from IDW Publishing that was adapted into a Netflix series starring Ian Somerhalder (Lost, Vampire Diaries).

Jonathan was an expert on the History Channel documentary series, Zombies: A Living History and True Monsters. And he participated in the commentary tracks for Night of the Living Dead: Reanimated. 

Rot & Ruin is in development for film by Alcon Entertainment, and was adapted as a Webtoon (a serialized comic formatted for cell phones), becoming their #1 horror comic.

His short story about body positivity and courage, “Fat Girl with a Knife”, is in development for a possible TV movie by Blue Ice Pictures (Toronto).

NONFICTION

Jonathan has sold more than 1,200 feature articles and 3,000 columns; as well as greeting cards, song lyrics, poetry, technical manuals, call-floor scripts, and two plays, including Tales from the Fire Zone.

He is also the author of a number of popular nonfiction books, including Vampire Universe (Citadel Press, 2006); The Cryptopedia (Citadel, 2007 –winner of the Bram Stoker Award for Outstanding Achievement in Nonfiction; co-authored by David F. Kramer); Zombie CSA: The Forensics of the Living Dead (Winner of the Hinzman and Black Quill Awards and finalist for a Stoker Award; 2008); They Bite! (2009 co-authored by David F. Kramer); Wanted Undead or Alive (2010; Bram Stoker finalist; co-authored by Janice Gable Bashman); The Vampire Slayers Field Guide to the Undead (2001, written under the pen name of Shane MacDougall); Ultimate Jujutso (Strider Nolan, 2001); Ultimate Sparring (Strider Nolan, 2000); Judo and You (Kendall Hunt 1991); and many others.

 

COMICS

He writes a variety of projects for various top comic book companies. His work for Marvel Comics included CAPTAIN AMERICA: HAIL HYDRA, BLACK PANTHER: POWER, DOOMWAR, WOLVERINE: FLIES TO A SPIDER, PUNISHER: NAKED KILLS, the NY Times bestselling MARVEL ZOMBIES RETURN; as well as his own franchise within Marvel --MARVEL UNIVERSE vs THE PUNISHER, MARVEL UNIVERSE vs WOLVERINE and MARVEL UNIVERSE vs THE AVENGERS.  He wrote the vampire miniseries BAD BLOOD for Dark Horse, which won the Bram Stoker Award for Best Graphic Novel in 2015; V-WARS and ROT & RUIN for IDW based on his bestselling novels; as well as  ROAD OF THE DEAD: HIGHWAY TO HELL, a prequel to the last zombie movie script by George A. Romero, writer/director of Night of the Living Dead. Adaptations of his short stories have appeared in EVIL JESTER COMICS and GRAVE CONDITIONS. Jonathan’s latest comic is PANDEMICA, a bioterrorism thriller about ethnic genocide, debuted in 2019 from IDW and was weirdly predictive of the Covid pandemic.

 

COMMUNITY

Jonathan created the Writers Coffeehouse, a free three-hour open-agenda networking and discussion session for writers of all genres and levels of skill in multiple locations around the country each month. Jonathan has opened Writers Coffeehouses in Willow Grove, PA, Philadelphia, Asheville, NC, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, and elsewhere. During the Covid-19 outbreak and subsequent social isolation, Jonathan began conducting the Writers Coffeehouses online, and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.

Jonathan and longtime friend and collaborator, the fantasist Gregory Frost, co-founded the Liars Club, a group of professional writers who do events in support of independent and chain bookstores, libraries, reading groups, and authors. The Liars Club does a wonderfully popular podcast called Liars Oddcast.

 

AWARDS

Jonathan has won Five Bram Stoker Awards from the Horror Writers Association; three Scribe Awards from the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers; the Inkpot Award from San Diego Comic Con; the Lincoln Award: Illinois Teen Readers' Choice Master List; ALA Best Books For Young Adults; Pennsylvania Young Reader's Choice Award Master List; Garden State Teen Book Award Nominee (NJ); Texas Lone Star Reading List; ALA Quick Picks Nominee; Keystone to Reading Book Award (PA); Nutmeg Book Award (CT); Cybils Award; South Dakota Young Adult Reading Program; Arkansas Teen Book Award Reading List; ALA Popular Paperbacks for Young Adults (Top Ten); the Gateway Readers Award (MO); the Dorothy Canfield Fisher Book Award Master List (VT); Kentucky Bluegrass Award Master List; Georgia Peach Book Award for Teen Readers Nominee; ALA "The Reading List" Selection; CA Westchester Fiction Award Winner; Bank Street Best Children's Book of the Year Selection Title; the Eva Perry Mock Printz medal; the Dead Letter Best Novel Award; and four Melinda Awards).

In 2003 he was inducted into the Action Karate International Martial Arts Hall of Fame; and in 2004 was inducted into the World Sokeship Head of Family Council for his extensive writing on martial arts and self-defense.

In February 2016 Jonathan had an award named after him and became the first recipient of The Jonathan Maberry Inspiring Teens Award, presented by the Canyon Crest Academy Writers Conference, the first free teen writers con in the country.

 

LIFE

Jonathan and his wife, Sara Jo, to whom he dedicates all of his published works, and their dog, Rosie, live in San Diego, California. His son, Sam West-Mensch is a real estate agent and property manager in San Diego County.

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Copyright Jonathan Maberry, LLC. Site design by John Langan. Author Photographs by Sara Jo West.

 

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