ABOUT ISAAC J BURNS
Stories under another name.
Isaac J Burns is the name Joe Butler writes fiction under.
The books range from family fantasy to darker speculative fiction, but they share an interest in strange places, forgotten things, flawed people and what happens when the world stops behaving as expected.
The name comes from somewhere real.
WHY ISAAC?
Isaac is my eldest son.
He was born sleeping at 38 weeks.
Using his name for my fiction was never about inventing another version of myself. It was a way of carrying his name forward.
He doesn’t get to grow up and make his own mark on the world. This is one small way I can make sure his name continues to travel through mine.
So when I write fiction, I write as Isaac J Burns.
His name goes on the books.
And, in that way, he goes a little further than he otherwise could.
A witness between worlds.
THE MAGPIE
In our family, magpies have become connected with Isaac.
When one appears in the real world, there are moments when it feels as though he is near.
When I created the Isaac J Burns identity, I wanted that to come with me too.
So a magpie walks through the fiction.
Sometimes it is obvious. Sometimes it is somewhere at the edge of the image. It doesn’t belong to one series or one world.
It is Isaac, walking those worlds with me as a witness.
More than one kind of world.
THE STORIES
The Dusklight Keepers is where Isaac J Burns begins publicly, but it is not the limit of the name.
Some stories are written for younger readers and families.
Others will be darker, stranger and built for adults — speculative fiction about broken systems, difficult choices, memory, identity and what people do when the rules holding their world together begin to fail.
Different audiences. Different worlds. The same name walking through them.
Fantasy · Speculative fiction · Children’s fiction · Adult fiction
Isaac J Burns · Fantasy & Speculative Fiction
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