Pauls Toutonghi

Pauls Toutonghi was born in Seattle, Washington, on July 4, 1976. His fiction has appeared in Zoetrope: All-Story, One Story Magazine, The Boston Review, Glimmer Train, Book Magazine, Terminus, and other small periodicals. He received a Pushcart Prize for his short story, "Regeneration," which appeared in The Boston Review in 2000, when Pauls was twenty-three. His first novel, Red Weather, was published by Random House on May 23, 2006. It has been receiving good reviews in periodicals across the country. His other writing has appeared in Sports Illustrated, The Crab Creek Review, and The Yemen Observer. He is a mongrel -- half-Latvian and half-Egyptian. His earliest memories are steeped in linguistic confusion. He received his MFA in poetry and his PhD in English literature from Cornell University. In order to support his writing habit, Pauls has worked as a burrito roller, a pizza delivery driver, a waiter in a retirement community, a vendor of vintage baseball jerseys, a project editor for Atlantic Coast Jet, a telemarketer, a sandwich maker, a college professor, a shipping clerk in a medical supply store, and a research assistant for the Complete Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson. He lives in Brooklyn, where the beauty and ugliness of the city are simultaneously evident. Also, the brisket sandwiches are unbelievable.