Joel Stein was born on July 23, 1971. He received a BA and an MA in English from Stanford University. He became a staff writer for TIME in 1997. He has written for numerous magazines including The New Yorker, GQ, Esquire, Details, Food and Wine, Travel and Leisure, Wired, Real Simple, Sunset, Playboy, Elle, and Los Angeles Times. Man Made: A Stupid Quest for Masculinity is his first book.