Avery Monsen: Writer Behind All My Friends Are Dead
Avery Monsen is an American writer, comedian, and performer best known for co-creating the darkly comic illustrated book **All My Friends Are Dead** with Jory John. His work includes humor books, comedy writing, performance, and short-form comic material. He is notable for a deadpan style that pairs simple drawings and plainspoken lines with jokes about loneliness, embarrassment, mortality, and social discomfort. The books are the clearest place to start because their credits are straightforward to verify and their style captures what readers most often associate with Monsen. Many short bios reduce his career to one viral title or repeat old claims without context. A more accurate view is that he has a long-running creative partnership with Jory John, alongside work that should be credited to each man separately.
Who is Avery Monsen?
Avery Monsen is an American writer, comedian, and performer known for concise comic writing and simple, expressive illustration. He became especially visible through humor books made with Jory John, but his work is not limited to publishing. His name also appears in comedy and performance contexts, including author biographies, entertainment credits, and sketch-oriented humor.
A useful shorthand is that Monsen is a comedy writer with a strong visual sensibility. His humor often begins with an ordinary premise and moves toward loneliness, embarrassment, mortality, or social discomfort. The tone is direct, understated, and deliberately a little bleak rather than built on elaborate satire or dense wordplay.
That style works well in both online posts and gift books. A page can contain one sentence and a small drawing, with the joke landing because the setup is immediately clear. The friendly-looking presentation makes the darker punch lines more surprising.
Monsen is sometimes described online as an actor, television writer, internet personality, or author of a single cult book. Those labels may reflect parts of his career, but they do not provide much context. “Author and comedian” is the most useful starting point because it covers both the books readers recognize and the comedy work associated with him.
Short biographies are not always current or well sourced. Older profile pages can preserve credits from a particular period, omit later work, or repeat details without identifying their source. A publisher credit for a book or a clearly attributed screen or performance credit is stronger evidence than a copied bio with no source trail.
Why All My Friends Are Dead is the work most people know
All My Friends Are Dead is the Avery Monsen title most readers recognize because its premise is easy to grasp. The book gives voice to animals, objects, and other figures whose friends are gone: a dinosaur, for example, has a literal reason to feel isolated. Clean cartoon-like images sit beside blunt statements about death, extinction, abandonment, and bad luck.
Monsen created the book with Jory John, and the shared credit matters. It reads as a joint comedy project, not as a conventional illustrated children’s book by one author. The drawings carry the joke alongside the text.
The title became widely recognized because it worked in several settings. Readers could find it as a bookstore gift, receive it from a friend with a dark sense of humor, or encounter individual pages online. Its jokes are compact enough to circulate easily, while the book format lets the central idea build through changing speakers and situations.
Its illustrated format can lead readers to assume it is for young children. The art resembles picture-book art, but the humor is aimed more at teens and adults who enjoy morbid, absurd, or ironic comedy. The contrast between a cute presentation and grim material is central to the book’s effect.
The book’s success led many people to associate Monsen with one phrase: “all my friends are dead.” That association is understandable, but it leaves out the related books and the broader comedy work connected to his name. It is the best entry point to his work, not the whole of it.
What Avery Monsen created with Jory John
Jory John is Avery Monsen’s best-known creative partner. Their jointly credited work shares a recognizable style: short, sharply phrased jokes, a gloomy or awkward point of view, and visual or structural ideas that make the comedy immediate.
The best-known jointly credited books include:
- All My Friends Are Dead
- All My Friends Are Still Dead
- K Is for Knifeball: An Alphabet of Terrible Advice
- I Feel Relatively Neutral About New York
The follow-up, All My Friends Are Still Dead, returns to the central premise of the first book. K Is for Knifeball uses an alphabet-book structure for deliberately bad advice and absurd associations. I Feel Relatively Neutral About New York turns to city life, and its title carries the same muted, anti-grandiose comic posture as the earlier books.
Monsen and John have also been associated with comedy performance and humor projects over a long period, and the success of the books often linked their public identities. That does not make them interchangeable writers. They have a distinct body of work together, as well as separate careers.
This matters when assigning credits. Jory John has written books and other projects on his own, including work outside the darkly comic illustrated-book style. Those solo titles should not automatically be attributed to Monsen. The same applies in reverse: a Monsen project is not necessarily a Jory John collaboration simply because their names are often mentioned together.
To verify a title, check the title page, publisher page, or library catalog record. Those sources usually distinguish authors, illustrators, contributors, and editions more reliably than quote-card accounts, resale listings, or profile pages that compress several projects into one biography.
His work outside the viral book series
Monsen’s career extends beyond the All My Friends Are Dead books. He has worked in comedy as a writer and performer, and his books are part of a broader body of published comic writing rather than a separate sideline.
His public work includes written jokes, illustrated book concepts, recorded or live performance work, and short-form comedy. Across those formats, the approach remains consistent: state the premise plainly, use economical language, and let the joke stand without a long explanation.
His published humor also includes the jointly credited books with Jory John. The sequel, alphabet-book parody, and observational humor about New York show variation within a consistent comic voice. They are not simply repetitions of the dinosaur-and-extinction premise that made the first book easy to recognize.
Monsen is also described as an actor or performer. That reflects his connection to comedy performance as well as writing, but any particular screen credit should be checked carefully. Screen-credit databases can help identify a production and role, but their records may be incomplete, use alternate name formatting, or lack context. A credit is strongest when it identifies the production, year, and role and can be checked against official production or network material.
The same caution applies to claims that he wrote for a particular television program or outlet. Comedy careers can include staff work, freelance contributions, live shows, web material, uncredited development, and appearances that are documented in different places. The available overview does not name a specific television program or outlet credit, so those claims should be verified project by project rather than repeated as a broad résumé.
The dependable public record is anchored in comedy publishing and his collaboration with Jory John. Broader claims about television, acting, or current projects need support from the specific production or outlet involved.
How to find Avery Monsen’s current work and verified credits
Start with the credit attached to the work you are trying to identify. For a book, a publisher page, title page, library catalog, or established bookseller record will usually show whether Avery Monsen is listed as an author, co-author, illustrator, or contributor. This is the simplest way to confirm the shared credits on books made with Jory John.
For screen, television, or performance work, look for a production’s official listing, a network or distributor page, festival materials, or a reputable credits database that names his role. Distinguish the role itself: writing, acting, producing, and performing are different credits.
A practical verification order is:
- Check the official publisher or production source first.
- Confirm the exact title, edition, release, or episode.
- Compare the role listed in a credits database with the primary source.
- Use verified public channels for announcements about newer work.
Older author bios can still help, especially when they appear with a book or an archived event listing. They usually describe a particular point in a career, not a permanent résumé. A bio written to promote All My Friends Are Dead, for example, may foreground that book and omit later writing or performance work. A social profile may instead emphasize current interests and leave out older credits.
The clearest short description is this: Avery Monsen is a writer, comedian, and performer best known as Jory John’s co-creator on All My Friends Are Dead and related humor books. Verify any specific television, film, stage, or publishing credit against the outlet that released it. That avoids reducing him to one viral title while also avoiding recycled, unsupported biography claims.
Conclusion
If you are trying to identify Avery Monsen from a single credit, start with the book or production itself. For most readers, **All My Friends Are Dead** is the clearest entry point, followed by the other books he made with Jory John. Be cautious with profile pages that turn a short description into a sweeping résumé without naming specific work. The reliable core is straightforward: Monsen is a comedy writer and performer whose deadpan illustrated humor became widely recognized through his collaboration with Jory John. With that context, individual credits are easier to place and verify.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who wrote All My Friends Are Dead?
**All My Friends Are Dead** is jointly credited to Avery Monsen and Jory John. The book combines concise dark humor with simple illustrations that are part of the joke.
Is Avery Monsen the illustrator of All My Friends Are Dead?
Monsen and Jory John are both credited for the book, whose humor depends on both words and drawings. For the exact breakdown of writing and illustration credits in a particular edition, check that edition’s title page or publisher record.
What other books did Avery Monsen make with Jory John?
Their notable jointly credited books include **All My Friends Are Still Dead**, **K Is for Knifeball: An Alphabet of Terrible Advice**, and **I Feel Relatively Neutral About New York**. The books use different formats but share a dry, absurd comic style.
Is Avery Monsen only known for All My Friends Are Dead?
No. It is his most recognizable title, but Monsen has also worked in comedy writing, performance, and other published humor projects. Check the relevant publisher or production source for a specific non-book credit.
Are Avery Monsen and Jory John the same person?
No. They are separate writers and long-time collaborators. They share credit on several humor books, but each has work that should be attributed to him individually.