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Jonathan Dylan Barker (born 1971) is a New York Times and international bestselling American author of suspense thrillers, often incorporating elements of horror, crime, mystery, science fiction, and the supernatural. His debut novel, Forsaken, was a finalist for a Bram Stoker Award in 2014.

Early life and career

Barker was born January 7, 1971, in Lombard, Illinois, and spent the first fourteen years of his life in Crystal Lake, Illinois. At fourteen, Barker's family relocated to Englewood, Florida. He attended Lemon Bay High School and graduated in 1989. He enrolled at the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale, where he later obtained a degree in business. While in college, a writing assignment found its way into the hands of Paul Gallotta of Circus magazine. Gallotta reached out to Barker and asked him to join the staff of 25th Parallel, where he worked alongside the man who would later become Marilyn Manson. Assignments dropped him into the center of pop culture, and by 1991 Barker had branched out, interviewing celebrities for the likes of Seventeen, TeenBeat, and other national and local publications. In 1992, Barker syndicated a small newspaper column called "Revealed" which centered around the investigation of haunted places and supernatural occurrences. He began work as a ghostwriter and book doctor, helping other authors for publication. Barker cites Stephen King, Dean Koontz, John Saul, and Neil Gaiman among his influences.

Stephen King read portions of Forsaken prior to publication and granted Barker permission to utilize the character of Leland Gaunt of King's Needful Things in the novel. Indie-published in late 2014, the book went on to hit some major milestones - #2 on Audible (Harper Lee with Go Set a Watchman held #1), #44 on Amazon U.S., #2 on Amazon Canada, and #22 on Amazon UK. Forsaken was also nominated for a Bram Stoker Award (Best Debut Novel) and won a handful of others, including a New Apple Medalist Award. After reading Forsaken, Bram Stoker's family reached out to Barker and asked him to co-author a prequel to Dracula utilizing Stoker's original notes and journals, much of which has never been made public.

Barker's indie success drew the attention of traditional agents and publishers, and in early 2016 his debut thriller, The Fourth Monkey, sold in a series of pre-empts and auctions worldwide, with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt set to publish in the U.S. and HarperCollins in the UK. The book has also sold for both film and television. In September 2017, Putnam purchased the publishing rights for Dracul in a five-house auction with additional publishers worldwide, and Paramount Pictures optioned the film rights, with Andy Muschietti set to direct.

In addition to writing his own novels, Barker has collaborated with American author James Patterson. Their first novel together, titled The Coast-to-Coast Murders, debuted at number 2 on the New York Times list on October 11, 2020. Their second collaboration, The Noise, released in August 2021, became an instant New York Times bestseller, and has been optioned by Entertainment One. Their third release, Death of the Black Widow, released in April 2022, and also became an instant New York Times bestseller.

Book Reviewer Controversy

In January 2024, a number of book reviewers on TikTok and Instagram received an email from Barker's email account, via a mailing list on Best of BookTok—a PR firm focusing on social media influencers, which Barker co-founded—offering to pay reviewers to pose nude with his book. After book reviewers objected and posted publicly about the inappropriate content of the emails, Barker sent a second email, claiming that the original request had come from an unnamed PR team that had access to his email account. In the wake of the controversy, Barker's agent dropped him from their client list.

Bibliography

Novels

• Forsaken (2014)ISBN 978-0990694908
• The Fourth Monkey (2017) ISBN 978-0544968844
• The Fifth to Die (2018) ISBN 978-0544973978
• Dracul with Dacre Stoker (2018) ISBN 978-0735219342
• The Sixth Wicked Child (2019) ISBN 978-0990694977
• She Has A Broken Thing Where Her Heart Should Be (2020) ISBN 978-1734210415
• The Coast-to-Coast Murders with James Patterson (2020) ISBN 978-0316457422
• A Caller's Game (2021) ISBN 978-1734210446
• The Noise with James Patterson (2021) ISBN 978-0316499873
• Death of the Black Widow with James Patterson (2022) ISBN 978-1538709825
• Behind A Closed Door (2024) ISBN 978-1734210477

Short stories

Filmography

Television

• The Fourth Monkey (CBS)
• The Noise (Entertainment One)

Feature films

• Dracul (Paramount Pictures)

Awards