Ander Monson grew up in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. He lived briefly in Saudi Arabia, Iowa, and in the Deep South, where he received his MFA from the University of Alabama. He is the editor of the magazine DIAGRAM and the New Michigan Press. His stories, essays, and poems have appeared in many literary magazines, including The North American Review , Fence , Field , Gulf Coast , The Bellingham Review , Ploughshares , Boston Review , and the Mississippi Review , among others. His books include Other Electricities (Sarabande Press, 2005) winner of the John C. Zacharis prize and finalist for the New York Public Library's Young Lions Award in 2006; Vacationland ( Tupelo Press, 2005); and Neck Deep and Other Predicaments: Essays (Graywolf Press, 2007) winner of the Graywolf Press Nonfiction Prize and a Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writers Award . He teaches at Grand Valley State University and lives in Grand Rapids, Michigan, with his wife, Megan, and three cats. His essay, Solipsism, is forthcoming in The Best American Essays 2008.