Richard Powers
Powers was born in Evanston, Illinois. His father was a high school principal. As a boy he lived in Bangkok, Thailand for five years while his father worked at the International School. In 1975 he went to college at the University of Illinois. He started studying physics but changed to English. He finished a masters degree in 1979. He moved to Boston in 1980 to do computer programming. One day, at Boston's Museum of Fine Art, he saw a photo by August Sander of three young men. In two days he quit his job and started writing his first novel, Three Farmers on Their Way to a Dance. That book was praised by many reviewers.