Dana Spiotta grew up mostly in California. She graduated from the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington in 1992.

In 1993 she moved to New York City. She was the managing editor (with Jodi Davis) of "The Quarterly" for two years. Scribner published her first novel, Lightning Field, in 2001. The Los Angeles Times called it "The hippest, funniest, most urbane and heartfelt account of life west of the 101 and north of the 10 to come along in years." It was a New York Times Notable Book of the year, and a Los Angeles Times Best Book of the West.

Her second novel, Eat the Document, was published in 2006 by Scribner. The New York Times called it "stunning" and described it as "a book that possesses the staccato ferocity of a Joan Didion essay and the razzle-dazzle language and the historical resonance of a Don DeLillo novel."

Spiotta now lives in a small rural village in upstate New York. She and her husband have a daughter, Agnes Coleman. When she isn't writing, Spiotta and her husband run their small country restaurant, The Rose & Kettle. The restaurant is on the ground floor of their home.

Biography courtesy of the author's official web site.

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