John Herman grew up in the outskirts of New York City. He received a Doctorate in English Literature from the University of California at Berkeley, and has taught at the Sorbonne (Paris IV), and the University of Massachusetts in Boston. He then worked in Manhattan as an editor, first at Simon and Schuster, then as the Editorial Director of Weidenfeld & Nicolson, and then of Ticknor & Fields, a division of Houghton Mifflin. For fifteen years he was the Associate Director of the Graduate Writing Program at Manhattanville College. Besides poems, essays, two picture books, and a chapbook of poetry, Herman has published four novels, The Weight of Love (selected by Publishers Weekly as one of the best novels of the year), and The Light of Common Day (both Nan Talese Books), as well as Deep Waters and Labyrinth (both Philomel Books). Mr. Herman resides with his wife in New York City and Canaan, New York. They have two daughters and six grandchildren.