Daniel Wallace

Daniel Wallace grew up in Birmingham, Alabama, with his three sisters. He studied English and philosophy at Emory University in Boston, but he eventually abandoned his studies to pursue a career in his father’s trading company in Nagoya, Japan. Finding himself ill-suited to the work, he quit to pursue writing, though he sometimes jokes that his father fired him. Wallace moved to North Carolina with his wife, where he worked in a bookstore while writing novels. Wallace was initially drawn to writing because he enjoys the “pure pleasure of invention,” and he says he learned how to write by simply trying to write, since he didn’t have a formal education at the time. He wrote five novels that were rejected by publishers before his sixth novel, Big Fish, was accepted for publication in 1998. It received widespread critical acclaim and has been since translated into 18 languages. Wallace resumed his education at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, while continuing to write, and graduated in 2008. He currently live in North Carolina with his wife and son, and he teaches English at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, while publishing novels. His eighth novel, The Kings and Queens of Roam, was published in 2013.