Nowell Marshall is a Wisconsin original. He studied fiction writing at the University of Wisconsin—Madison, received his M.A. in English at Arizona State University, and completed his Ph.D. at the University of California, Riverside.

He has published short fiction as well as articles on William Blake's Visions of the Daughters of Albion, Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway, and rhetorics of the body in City of Heroes. He currently teaches at the University of Wisconsin—Platteville.

He has also been a journalist, editor, web designer, and basement rockstar. Over the years, he has held dozens of illustrious "Bohemian dream" jobs.

He is an avid online gamer who enjoys cooking, fiction writing, drinking lots of latté, and playing bass.