Steve Almond is the author of eleven books of fiction and nonfiction, including the New York Times bestsellers Candyfreak and Against Football, and the forthcoming Truth is the Arrow, Mercy is the Bow, a book on the writer's craft. After many failed efforts, his debut novel, All the Secrets of the World, came out in 2022. The book has been optioned by 20th Century Fox, and based on an excerpt, Almond was awarded a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. His essays and reviews have been published in venues ranging from The New York Times Magazine to Ploughshares to Poets & Writers, and his short fiction has appeared in the Best American Short Stories, the Pushcart Prize, the Best American Mysteries, and the Best American Erotica. Almond co-hosted the Dear Sugars podcast with his pal Cheryl Strayed for four years, and teaches Creative Writing at the Neiman Fellowship at Harvard and Wesleyan.