Erik Forrest Jackson is an author, playwright, and longtime entertainment journalist who has spent his career celebrating the stories, stars, and fandoms people love most. People Magazine has called him “a pop-culture expert,” and after years as an executive editor at Entertainment Weekly and InStyle, he’s written and edited books and special magazine editions devoted to everyone from Taylor Swift and Wicked to Saturday Night Live and Mission: Impossible.
Erik is the creator of Penguin Random House’s POP! Playbooks series of interactive activity books for kids and the author of Disney and Penguin’s Muppets Meet the Classics series, both published by Penguin Workshop. The first book, Taylor and Travis: A Love Story Album (July 2026). When he’s not dreaming up new books for
pop-culture superfans, he writes plays and musicals, including Christmas in Connecticut, adapted from the beloved Warner Bros. film.
Whether he’s covering celebrities, creating interactive books, or telling stories for the stage, Erik loves exploring the joyful intersection of entertainment, nostalgia, and fandom, and he firmly believes there’s no such thing as knowing too much about your favorite star.
Find Erik at: www.erikforrestjackson.com, and follow him on Twitter: @MrErikJackson