Official bio: Sam Kean is the New York Times-bestselling author of seven books. He spent years collecting mercury from broken thermometers as a kid, and now lives in Washington, D.C. His stories have appeared in National Geographic, The Best American Science and Nature Writing, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and Slate, among other places, and his work has been featured on NPR’s “Radiolab”, “Science Friday”, and “All Things Considered.” The Bastard Brigade was a “Science Friday” book of the year, while Caesar’s Last Breath was the Guardian science book of the year. The Disappearing Spoon was a runner-up for the Royal Society book of the year. The Violinist’s Thumb and The Dueling Neurosurgeons were nominated for PEN’s literary science writing award, and Dinner with King Tut was named a best book of the year by the New Yorker, Smithsonian, Amazon, and the History Channel, and won the Non-Obvious Book Award for most original book.
Unofficial bio: Sam Kean gets called Sean at least once a month. He grew up in South Dakota, which means more to him than it probably should. He’s a fast reader but a very slow eater. He went to college in Minnesota and studied physics and English. At night, he sometimes comes down with something called “sleep paralysis,” which is the opposite of sleepwalking. One of his books appeared in an iPhone commercial once. Right now, he lives in Washington, D.C., where he earned a master’s degree in library science that he will probably never use. He feels very strongly that open-faced sandwiches are superior to regular ones.