I write science fiction and fantasy. Like Neil Gaiman, Kelly Link, Ray Bradbury, Ursula K. Le Guin, or Michael Chabon, my writing carries me across genres, and I constantly wish to challenge readers’ perceptions of genre — I love any tale excellently told.
Leave the world awhile — or explore its every nook. Give my stories a read.
Active SFWA.
Find Your Next Favorite Story
Bett wants more than anything to survive. But how do you survive the end of the world?
A plague called Blight. Violence, fire, and zealotry. Fear, floods, famine, and war. Bett must overcome these, and she must keep moving.
To the north, the U.S. military has cordoned off Fairbanks, inviting survivors of Blight to hole up as long as possible in the wilds of Alaska. A generation or two is all the Earth’s got left, but maybe they can make the best of it?
To the south, a self-proclaimed King is offering everyday people a one-way ticket off the Earth. Avidità, one of the New Gods of the emerging technological singularity, is the only trillionaire who doesn’t seem anxious to leave the poor behind.
In the crux of her decision, Bettina encounters a bewildering, witchy woman who speaks with animals and who listens to whispers on the wind. Mystifying things walk the enduring forests, and rumours of Old Gods spread terror throughout the Cascades.
Old Gods who have no intention of letting the Earth die. Old Gods who want Bett on their side. Read When the World Ends today.
Minuscule Truths collects ten stories of speculative literature — from hard-science fiction to dark, mythopoetic fantasy — and weaves them into an experience which will haunt you long after you’ve read the last word. Many of these tales appear in print for the first time, while others clawed their way into existence through the likes of Analog Science Fiction and Fact or Crossed Genres.
About J.L. Forrest’s short stories, Honest Indie Reviews writes, “Forrest’s stories put Faulkner’s ‘eternal verities’ of love, honor, courage and compassion on bold display, gems in ring settings of the bizarre, dramatic and even frightening. These are great stories from a writer who knows the techniques of good writing and infuses them with heart, soul, insight and a fearful imagination.”
Publisher Jessica Brawner writes, “This is an entertaining mix of short stories that draws the reader into each new world the author explores. Mr. Forrest has a great command of language and vividly paints his characters.”
Delicate Ministrations brings together eleven powerful, insightful, and entertaining works of science fiction and fantasy, including the novella Liminal. These tales carry us to the far reaches of space, then draw us into intimate fantasies whose fearful insights expose the brightest and darkest parts of ourselves.
Reviewer Benyakir Horowitz described these stories as a cross between Kurt Vonnegut and and Kurt Cobain.
Requies Dawn is the first installment of the Eternal Requiem. It is the tale of a terrifying and perfect future, one which ultimately shatters, leaving the world to begin again.
In this far future, Nyahri hunts with her tribe and tends her horses—dreaming of Old Gods.
When one Goddess arises, hell bent on righting old wrongs and exacting her own justice, Nyahri follows, and she discovers both horrors and an ancient love which cannot die.
Announcements & Upcoming Events
I’ll be panelling and fully present at the 50th anniversary of MileHiCon in Denver, Colorado on October 19, 20, and 21 of 2018. This’ll be my fifth MileHiCon, and I hope you’ll join me there.
Lampblack and Dust
The story “Lampblack and Dust” has enjoyed several lives so far, and I don’t think it’s done yet. An abridged version first appeared in Principia Ponderosa, published by Third Flatiron, in 2017. By that autumn, it earned a nomination to the Pushcart Prize, then appeared again in Third Flatiron’s best-of collection for that year.
Sometime not too far into 2019, I expect to include the unabridged version of “Lampblack and Dust” in a third collection of short fiction, Peculiar Declarations.