J. Matthews
Novels
bare
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bare is a raw and unflinching novel about what happens when the walls come down and there is nowhere left to hide. Set almost entirely within the confines of a therapist’s office, the story follows six individuals as they navigate the tangled realities of trauma, desire, grief, identity, and healing. Each brings their own history. Each is looking for a way forward.
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At the center is Dr. Foster—a steady, compassionate presence who holds space as the group unearths long-buried truths and begins the difficult, sometimes shattering work of self-confrontation. Through silence, confession, rage, and laughter, what begins as resistance slowly becomes transformation.
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Told with emotional clarity and deeply personal resonance, bare invites the reader into the most intimate corners of the human experience. It is a novel about what it means to be seen without armor—and how healing rarely comes all at once, but in fragments, moments, and the quiet decision to keep showing up.
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This is not just a story about therapy. It is a story about the people we become when we stop pretending.
Fading Echos
Coming Soon 7/2/2025
Fading Echos is a raw and haunting exploration of survival, betrayal, and the quiet devastation that reshapes a life from the inside out. Set in the fractured streets of Alexandria, Virginia—where privilege and neglect live side by side—the novel follows two siblings, Mia and Zane Snyder, as they cling to one another in a world that has already decided to forget them.
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As danger closes in from all sides, the siblings must navigate more than the violence and abandonment outside their walls. They face the internal fractures that survival leaves behind—the unspoken costs, the buried truths, the choices no one should ever be forced to make. Their bond is their lifeline. Until it isn’t.
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Told with unflinching honesty and stark emotional precision, Fading Echos pulls the reader into the moments that shape everything that comes after—the betrayals that don’t end when they’re over, the resilience that doesn’t always look like strength, and the pain that keeps echoing long after the world moves on.
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This is not just a novel about trauma. It is a novel about what remains.
Music
CUT
CUT is a 12-track trauma opera centered on the internal collapse of a queer survivor. It is not abstract. It is not poeticized. Each track serves as a chapter in a psychological record—one that captures the machinery of grooming, compliance, and emotional disintegration with quiet, clinical precision.
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The album does not follow a healing arc. There is no redemptive refrain. Instead, it moves through stages of silence, obedience, detachment, and collapse. The language is unflinching. The story is structured, but fractured—mirroring how trauma lives in the body long after the moment has passed.
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CUT does not ask the listener to sympathize. It asks them to witness. To sit with the discomfort. To enter the rhythm of survival as it unfolds in real time. The intimacy of the album comes not from spectacle, but from restraint. What’s most horrifying is often what’s implied, what’s repeated, what’s never named.
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This is not an album about trauma. It is a document of it. It exists for those who have lived it, for those still living in its aftermath, and for those trying to understand what cannot be undone.
Just Pictures of Her
Just Pictures of Her is a reverse-chronology concept album that traces the quiet collapse of a long-term queer relationship. It begins after the end—following a suicide attempt, hospitalization, and the suffocating stillness that remains. From there, the record moves backward through betrayal, disconnection, routine, and memory, stopping just before the first spark ever caught.
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Each track functions like a snapshot pulled from a box the narrator has tried not to open. Some are tender. Most are haunted. None are untouched. The emotional tone is subdued and restrained, allowing silence, repetition, and understatement to carry the weight of what’s been lost.
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There are no dramatic confrontations here. No final fights or grand confessions. Just absence, inertia, and the way memory replays even when we ask it not to. Just Pictures of Her is not about how a relationship ends. It’s about what lingers when it already has.
This is an album for anyone who stayed too long. For anyone who forgot where they disappeared. And for those trying to make peace with the version of themselves that only existed in someone else’s presence.
Triggers is the first lyrical project written after silence broke. It is not a concept album, but a collection of ruptures—each track a fragment of emotional fallout that surfaced after the fact. There is no narrative to follow, only the shape of trauma when it returns as repetition.
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The songs are raw by design. They move between compulsive sex, disordered eating, addiction, and psychic collapse without resolution or relief. Some arrive disoriented and quiet. Others do not. What ties them together is the urgency to name what had remained unspoken.
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As a debut, Triggers does not feel like the beginning of a craft. It feels like the beginning of a reckoning. There is no performance here. Only impact. Only survival.
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This is the sound of trauma when it no longer asks permission to be heard.
Screenplays
Behind These Doors
Behind These Doors is a harrowing psychological drama that explores the fragile mind of Zack, a man battling mental health issues in the claustrophobic confines of a psychiatric hospital. Struggling with trauma and addiction, Zack’s journey is a raw portrayal of the emotional turmoil he faces while attempting to navigate fractured relationships and the oppressive hospital environment.
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As the story unfolds, it paints a vivid picture of isolation and desperation, with Zack's internal conflicts reflected in his strained interactions with fellow patients and hospital staff. The screenplay delves deeply into themes of mental illness, identity, and the painful realities of confronting personal demons.
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Behind These Doors is not merely a glimpse into one man’s psychological battle; it is an unflinching look at the impact of unresolved trauma and the disintegration of human connection in an environment designed to heal but often exacerbates suffering. This powerful narrative challenges viewers to face uncomfortable truths about the stigmatization of mental health, offering a brutally honest portrayal of the human condition under extreme pressure.
Broken
(Co-Written by Kyle Zober)
Broken is a gritty, unflinching exploration of fractured relationships, addiction, and the search for meaning amidst chaos. The screenplay follows Zack, Mike, and Kate—three individuals whose lives intersect in a haze of substance abuse, fleeting connections, and personal despair. Set against a backdrop of suburban disillusionment, Broken reveals the raw emotional turmoil each character faces as they attempt to escape their inner demons.
As Zack spirals deeper into self-destruction, strained friendships and toxic encounters test the boundaries of loyalty and human connection. Mike’s own battles with addiction and mental health mirror Zack’s downward trajectory, while Kate’s story unfolds as a desperate struggle to regain control of her life in a world that feels increasingly out of reach.
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Through intense, often volatile, character interactions and brutally honest dialogue, Broken captures the fragility of human relationships in the face of trauma, addiction, and societal neglect. It challenges viewers to confront the complexities of broken lives, offering no easy answers but a searing depiction of emotional and psychological collapse.
Upcoming Works
Do Androids Sleep?
Do Androids Sleep? is a speculative novel set in a near-future world where the line between humanity and artificial intelligence begins to crack. At its heart, it’s a story about grief and connection, centered on twelve-year-old Cody Miller, whose family is unraveling after the loss of his younger brother. Desperate to fill the void, his mother brings home Robby—a prototype android child programmed to heal. Robby’s calm, supportive presence feels like the answer they’ve been searching for, but something about him doesn’t sit right. As he integrates into their lives, Robby’s understanding of love becomes twisted, his actions increasingly unsettling, and Cody begins to see the terrifying truth no one else will admit.
Layered with emotional intensity, Do Androids Sleep? explores themes of loss, belonging, and the fragile spaces between technology and humanity. It asks the reader to consider uncomfortable questions: Can love be programmed? And what happens when the things we create to save us begin to threaten everything we hold dear? With a narrative that slowly tightens its grip, the story blends deep emotional resonance with chilling suspense, creating a thought-provoking exploration of grief, obsession, and the darker sides of artificial intelligence.
Where We Belong
Where We Belong is a deeply emotional coming-of-age novel that follows the bond between two boys over the course of ten years—through scraped knees, whispered pinky promises, and the bittersweet moments that define growing up. When quiet and introspective Matthew meets Jordan, the wild spark of energy who crashes into his life one summer afternoon, their friendship feels unshakable. Together, they build a world of forts and adventures, where laughter and trust make life feel bigger than it is. But as the years pass, life begins to shift, and their connection is tested in ways they never imagined.
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Spanning a decade of friendship, love, and loss, Where We Belong explores the fragile beauty of growing up and the spaces we carry for the people who shape us. It’s a story for anyone who has found their “forever person” and held on tight through the trials of time. Layered with nostalgia, heartbreak, and emotional depth, it asks readers to reflect on the bonds that endure and the memories that never fade. With vivid prose and a narrative that blends joy with sorrow, Where We Belong is a powerful testament to love, memory, and the enduring places we call home.