About the Author.

Neil Offen is the internationally best-selling author of the international bestsellers Gidget Goes Red Chinese, The How to Get Fat Diet and other international bestsellers, as well as the man behind critically acclaimed supermarket shopping lists.

Lauded as “that guy,” by The New York Times and hailed as “him,” by National Public Radio, Offen’s works have been published in a variety of formats, including ink, pen and crayon and, once, under duress, his wife’s eyebrow pencil.

He has received many honors, beginning with the bronze medal in his fourth-grade spelling bee contest, and has been named Un Homme Tres Etrange, by the French government, the highest honor it can bestow on someone who doesn’t know how to pronounce camembert.

Offen began his writing career early, writing notes home from summer camp pleading with his parents to please get him out of there before they have to attempt the zip line over the lake on Thursday.

Although his parents had planned on a career as a nuclear physicist for him, even if they had no idea what that was, Offen instead showed his preference for using words, frequently coming in a close second in family Boggle games. He would have even won one game, too, if he had only known how to use the magic cube to spell physicist.

While in school, he forged ahead in his writing career, devoting himself to the intellectually challenging pursuit of writing limericks when he should have been paying attention in calculus class. He ultimately gave up that career when he ran out of acceptable rhymes for limericks that began, “There once was a man from Nantucket.”

A master of multiple fields of writing, Offen has dipped his pen in journalism, poetry, fiction, non-fiction, IOUs and absolute lying. An early adopter of the new digital technology to enhance his writing, he has managed to misplace important things he has written on his desktop, his iPad and his iPhone.

His works, particularly his e-mails and some of his texts, are in the permanent collection of his friends Marty, Richard and Clay, mainly because they are old and none of them are quite sure yet how to permanently delete items from their inbox.

He has written for the neighborhood listserv, frequently asking for recommendations for reliable handymen, and contributed as well to birthday cards for most members of his immediate family.

Offen lives in Carrboro, North Carolina, but likes to imagine he’s still in the south of France, where the wine is cheaper, which is why he always says bon jour to the mailman and occasionally to the next-door neighbors. The next-door neighbors have occasionally tried to have him committed, but the authorities no longer respond to their hysterical calls.

Offen lives with his wife, two real children and three imaginary dogs, because they could never get a real one since he’s allergic.