Steve Tomasula is the author of the novels The Book of Portraiture (FC2); IN & OZ (Ministry of Whimsy Press); VAS: An Opera in Flatland (republished by University of Chicago Press), an acclaimed novel of the biotech revolution; and most recently, TOC: A New-Media Novel (FC2/University of Alabama Press).
Incorporating narrative forms of all kinds—from comic books, travelogues, journalism or code to Hong Kong action movies or science reports—Tomasula’s writing has been called a ‘reinvention of the novel,’ combining an ‘attention to society in the tradition of Orwell, attention to language in the tradition of Beckett, and the humor of a Coover or Pynchon.’ His writing often crosses visual, as well as written genres, drawing on science and the arts to take up themes of how we represent what we think we know, and how these representations shape our lives. His short fiction has been published widely, and most recently in McSweeney’s, The Denver Quarterly, Fiction International, American Letters & Commentary, Western Humanities Review, Ninth Letter, and The Iowa Review where he received the Iowa Prize for the most distinguished work published in any genre.
Recent essays on body art, literature and culture can be found in Data Made Flesh (Routledge), Musing the Mosaic (SUNY), Leonardo (M.I.T.), and numerous magazines both here and in Europe. He holds a doctorate in English from the University of Illinois at Chicago and directs the program for writers at the University of Notre Dame.