Contact: jbaltisberger @ gmail.com
John is currently scheduling his 2025/2026 calendar and is available for events, speaking engagements, anthologies, collabs, and forewords. He is unavailable for blurbs and unsolicited manuscripts at this time.
“[Baltisberger] is genuinely the backbone of modern Jewish horror”
Jewish Horror Review
“Baltisberger is the new standard in epic horror poetry and rivals anything like it in classic horror literature. This is not dark prose, it is evocative, graphic verse.”
Lisa Lee Tone, bibliophilia templum
“Adapting unnatural ideas into a twisted mass of contorted images is an obvious strength of Baltisberger. His ingredients of bile, bone and viscera make up a recipe specifically geared towards a baked gore platter served on each and every page.”
Mike Rankin, Horror Bookworm Reviews
“Baltisberger shows himself to be an occultic iconoclast counterpart to Lin-Manuel Miranda: he overturns icons, constructs a a rich mythology from the rubble of that which has been torn down, and conveys it all with pulsing, infectiously inventive trash-talk.”
Doris V. Sutherland, Attack of the Six-Foot Tranny
“Baltisberger’s command of language, rhythm, and structure is phenomenal. Many of [his book’s] sections rage off the page, passionate and fervored.”
Christine Morgan, Splatterpunk Award-Winning Author of Lakehouse Infernal & Trench Mouth
John Baltisberger is a multi-award winning author and game designer of speculative and genre fiction and gonzo games. Known for his brutal splatterpunk, occult musings, and innovative prose, John has written sci-fi, fantasy, horror, poetry, nonfiction, and romance.
When not writing fiction, John edits, writes, and designs games like the Wandie-winning Odd Gobs and the Ennie-winning Obscure. He is well known for his work in the Mork Borg space for having written several novelizations of the game and for creating third-party content such as Morkkabeans and Apostles of Affliction.
Beyond his writing career, John is the Publishing Editor of Madness Heart Press, including its imprints; Aggadah Try It and Gutter Mystic Books, which focuses on transgressive fiction, Jewish genre fiction, and gonzo nonfiction respectively. He is also the Creative Director of Madness Heart Games, which focuses on creating interesting TTRPGS and pioneering the BADASS system.
Awards:
- Best Collection – Wonderland Awards 2024 (All I Want is To Take Shrooms and Listen to the Color of Nazi Screams)
- Judges Spotlight – Ennies, 2024 (Obscure)
- Best Game Mechanics – Wandies 2023 (Odd Gobs)
- Bronze Medal – Godless 666 Awards 2023 (Abhorrent Faith)
- Gold Medal – Godless 666 Awards 2022 (Unclean Verses Cantos I & II)
- Silver Medal – Godless 666 Awards 2022 (The Crimes and Passions of John Stabberger Season 1)
- Best Editor – Critter Annual Reader’s Poll 2019 (Madness Heart Press)
Nominations:
- Poetry Full Book – Science Fiction Poetry Association, Elgin Awards 2019 (Configuration Discordant)
- Best Novella – Horror Author’s Guild 2021 (Abhorrent Siren)
- Best Collection – Splatterpunk Awards 2021 (War of Dictates)
