Philipp Meyer grew up in Baltimore, MD, where he dropped out of high school at 16 and got a GED. He worked as a bike mechanic and an orderly in a trauma center and was admitted to Cornell University at age 23. He graduated with a degree in English and headed to Wall Street as a derivatives trader. A few years later, he left Wall Street with hopes of becoming a novelist. He quickly went broke and moved back into his parent’s basement in Baltimore, taking jobs as an EMT and construction worker and working as a volunteer firefighter. In 2005, Meyer became one of the first EMTs to respond to Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, driving his own car there and arriving during the middle of the storm. In 2008, he got an MFA at the Michener Center for Writers.
Meyer’s first novel, American Rust, won a Los Angeles Times Book Prize, was an Economist Book of the Year, a New York Times Notable Book, and a Washington Post Book of the Year. Meyer was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Dobie Paisano Fellowship, and named as one of the New Yorker magazine’s twenty best writers under forty. Meyer’s second novel, The Son, was a bestseller in a dozen countries and published in thirty languages. It was runner up for the Pulitzer Prize. In France, The Son won the Prix Littérature-Monde as well as the Lucien Barrière Prize. Meyer is a Chevalier (Knight) in France's Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. Both The Son and American Rust have been adapted into television shows. The Son starred Pierce Brosnan. American Rust starred Jeff Daniels.
Meyer’s third book, The City, is a dystopian epic inspired by the Divine Comedy. It takes place at the end of the world. It will be published in 2026.