Evan Mandery
Evan Mandery is the author of eight books, including four novels, as well as the co-creator and executive producer of the TV series Artificial, for which he won Peabody and Emmy awards in 2019. A leading expert on the death penalty, Evan’s book, A Wild Justice: The Death and Resurrection of Capital Punishment in America, was a New York Times Editors’ Pick, a Kirkus best book of the year, and an ABA Silver Gavel honorable mention. A graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School, Evan has been an outspoken critic of legacy admissions since publishing an op-ed in The New York Times in 2014. His new book Poison Ivy: How Elite Colleges Divide Us offers a devastating critique of how elite colleges and suburbs work together to exacerbate social inequality. Evan is also a regular contributor to Politico. He lives in Montclair, New Jersey with his wife, Valli Rajah-Mandery, a sociologist. They have three children.
“Give up on trying to be original. Every song has been sung, every picture has been painted, and every story has been told. The best one can do is sing, draw, or tell it again well.”
“Voters, like history, are under no obligation to make sense.”
“I also believe, without any supporting evidence, that cats are evil.”
“I have no special desire to go crawl around in caves, but I really like the word [spelunking] and want to use it in conversation. I do a lot of things just to use words I like.”
“We're about to live through history and it's incredibly exciting. But don't make the mistake of thinking life stops because of any of this.”