Robert P. Baird

Robert P. Baird

Hi, I’m a novelist, journalist, and editor.

In 2025, Henry Holt published my debut novel, The Nimbus, which The New Yorker called one of the “Best Books of the Year So Far” and The Washington Post put on its list of notable fiction. It’s available in hardcover, ebook, and audiobook formats wherever books are sold. I’ve also done a bunch of writing, for a bunch of outlets, on a bunch of subjects, in a bunch of genres. You can find some of that work here.

In past lives, I worked as an editor at The New Yorker, Harper’s Magazine, The Paris Review, Chicago Review, and Esquire. More recently I’ve done part-time editorial work for publications such as The Guardian Long Read and Foreign Affairs.

I grew up in Chico, California, studied mechanical engineering and human biology at Stanford, and completed a master’s degree and a Ph.D. at the University of Chicago Divinity School. (I wrote a dissertation on Dante.) I have accounts on Bluesky and Instagram, and can be reached by email here. Currently I live in Brooklyn with my wife, my children, and my dog.