Bret Anthony Johnston

Bret Anthony Johnston is an American author, novelist and essayist. He is the author of the novels Remember Me Like This and We Burn Daylight, as well as the short story collection, Corpus Christi: Stories. He is the editor of the non-fiction work, Naming the World and Other Exercises for the Creative Writer. He won the 2017 Sunday Times Short Story Award. He is a graduate of Miami University and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, where he received his Master of Fine Arts in 2002.

Career Johnston was the recipient of a 2006 National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellowship. It was shortlisted for Ireland’s Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award.

His debut novel, Remember Me Like This, was a New York Times Notable Book of the year and winner of the McLaughlin-Esstman-Stearns First Novel Prize. We Burn Daylight was awarded the 2025 Jesse H. Jones Award for Best Book of Fiction from the Texas Institute of Letters and the 2024 Writers' League of Texas Book Award in Fiction.

In 2012, the documentary film Waiting for Lightning premiered at the SXSW Film Festival and was released by Samuel Goldwyn Films. The film was written by Johnston and directed by Jacob Rosenberg.

Johnston is the Director of the Michener Center for Writers at The University of Texas at Austin, where he teaches fiction writing. He was previously the Director of the Creative Writing program at Harvard University. He briefly toured the U.S. with a sponsor and professional skateboarding crew before enrolling in graduate school. His passion for skateboarding comes up frequently in his writing and interviews.

In February 2026, Johnston released his second short story collection, Encounters with Unexpected Animals: Stories.

Awards and honors 2005 Steven Turner Award for Best First Fiction 2006 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship 2015 McLaughlin-Esstman-Stearns First Novel Prize 2017 Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Short Story Award for "Half of What Atlee Rouse Knows About Horses" 2024 Writers' League of Texas Book Award in Fiction

Works Fiction Collections

Novels

Non-fiction

Film Waiting for Lightning (screenwriter) (2012)