Born in 1929, Chaim Potok grew up and was educated in New York. After being ordained as a rabbi, he took a Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Pennsylvania, and worked as a chaplain with the US Forces in Korea from 1955-57. His novels The Chosen, The Promise, In the Beginning, The Book of Lights, My Name is Asher Lev, The Gift of Asher Lev and I am The Clay, have all been published by Penguin. He is also the author of Wanderings, a history of the Jews; of a children's book, The Tree of Here; and of three plays, Out of the Depths, Sins of the Father and The Play of Lights. He died in 2002.

Shalom Auslander is the author of the memoir, The Foreskin's Lament (Picador 2007) and Beware of God, a collection of short stories about growing up Jewish (Picador 2006). His work has appeared in the New Yorker, the New York Times, and theGuardian, among others, and he is regular contributor to Public Radio International's "This American Life." He lives in New York.