Michael Lewis

Michael Lewis
Born	Michael Monroe Lewis 15 10, 1960
Birthplace	New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S.
Nationality	American
Occupation	Nonfiction writer, journalist
Known for	Liar's Poker, Moneyball, The Blind Side, The Big Short, Flash Boys, Going Infinite
Website	[[michaellewiswrites.com michaellewiswrites.com] Official site]

Michael Monroe Lewis (born October 15, 1960) is an American author and financial journalist whose narrative nonfiction has shaped public understanding of Wall Street, professional sports, behavioral psychology, and Silicon Valley. Born and raised in New Orleans, Lewis first gained prominence with his 1989 debut, Liar's Poker, a semi-autobiographical account of his years as a bond salesman at Salomon Brothers during the excesses of 1980s Wall Street. He went on to write a succession of bestselling books, including Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game (2003), The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game (2006), The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine (2010), Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt (2014), The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds (2016), and Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon (2023). Several of his books have been adapted into major motion pictures, including The Blind Side (2009), Moneyball (2011), and The Big Short (2015). Lewis has served as a contributing editor to Vanity Fair since 2009, writing primarily on business, finance, and economics. His books have won two Los Angeles Times Book Prizes, and several have reached number one on The New York Times Best Seller list.

Early Life

Michael Monroe Lewis was born on October 15, 1960, in New Orleans, Louisiana. He grew up in an established New Orleans family, surrounded by the culture and traditions of the city. His upbringing in the American South would later inform several of his works, most notably The Blind Side, which explored both the world of American football in the South and broader questions about race, class, and opportunity.

Lewis spent his formative years in New Orleans, where he developed interests that would eventually lead him toward a career in writing. Details of his childhood and family life have been referenced in various interviews and profiles over the years, though Lewis has generally been more forthcoming about his professional experiences than his personal background. His Southern roots and the social milieu of New Orleans, a city defined by its distinctive class structures and cultural identity, would become recurring touchstones in his work and public persona.

Education

Lewis attended Princeton University, where he studied art history and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree. His choice of major—art history rather than economics or finance—was notable given his subsequent career trajectory. At Princeton, Lewis was exposed to a broad liberal arts education that would later serve as the foundation for the narrative style and intellectual curiosity that characterized his writing.

After graduating from Princeton, Lewis pursued graduate studies at the London School of Economics, where he earned a Master of Science degree in economics. The combination of an undergraduate education in the humanities and a graduate degree in economics gave Lewis a distinctive intellectual toolkit: the ability to understand and analyze complex financial systems while communicating them in accessible, story-driven prose. His time in London also placed him in proximity to the European financial markets, setting the stage for his entry into the world of investment banking.

Career

Wall Street and Liar's Poker (1985–1989)

After completing his studies at the London School of Economics, Lewis entered the financial industry, taking a position as a bond salesman at Salomon Brothers, one of the most powerful investment banks on Wall Street during the 1980s. He joined the firm during a period of rapid expansion in the bond market, particularly in the burgeoning field of mortgage-backed securities. Lewis's experience at Salomon Brothers exposed him to the culture of excess, risk-taking, and aggressive salesmanship that defined Wall Street during the era.

Rather than building a long-term career in finance, Lewis channeled his experiences into his first book, Liar's Poker: Rising Through the Wreckage on Wall Street, published in 1989. The book was a semi-autobiographical account of life inside Salomon Brothers, offering readers an insider's view of the bond trading floor and the personalities who populated it. Lewis depicted the firm's legendary chairman John Gutfreund and the culture of macho one-upmanship that pervaded the trading desks. Liar's Poker became an immediate bestseller and established Lewis as a leading chronicler of American finance.

The book's title referred to a bluffing game played by traders at Salomon Brothers using the serial numbers on dollar bills, which Lewis used as a metaphor for the broader culture of deception and risk that he witnessed on Wall Street. The publication of Liar's Poker marked Lewis's transition from finance professional to full-time writer, a career he would pursue for the next three and a half decades.

Journalism and Early Books (1990s–2000s)

Following the success of Liar's Poker, Lewis turned to full-time writing and journalism. Over the course of the 1990s and into the 2000s, he produced a series of books and articles covering a diverse range of subjects, from politics to technology to culture. His approach consistently involved immersing himself in a subject, identifying a compelling character or narrative thread, and using that story to illuminate larger systemic truths.

Lewis's writing appeared in numerous prominent publications. He contributed to The New York Times Magazine, The New Republic, and other outlets before becoming a contributing editor at Vanity Fair in 2009. His arrival at Vanity Fair was noted in media circles; The New York Observer reported that the magazine's editor, Graydon Carter, had recruited Lewis from Condé Nast Portfolio, a business magazine that was folding at the time.

At Vanity Fair, Lewis wrote extensively on business, finance, and economics, including a notable 2010 piece titled "Beware of Greeks Bearing Bonds," which examined the Greek government-debt crisis and its implications for the European economy.

Moneyball (2003)

In 2003, Lewis published Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, a book that would become one of his most influential works and transform the public discourse around sports analytics. The book focused on Billy Beane, the general manager of the Oakland Athletics, and his use of sabermetrics—advanced statistical analysis—to assemble a competitive baseball team despite having one of the lowest payrolls in Major League Baseball.

Lewis argued that Beane and his front office, influenced by the statistical work of analysts like Bill James, had identified market inefficiencies in how baseball players were evaluated. By focusing on undervalued statistical measures such as on-base percentage rather than traditional scouting metrics, the Athletics were able to compete against far wealthier franchises. Moneyball reached number one on The New York Times Best Seller list and sparked a wider conversation about the application of data analytics in professional sports and other fields.

The book's influence extended well beyond baseball. The concept of "moneyball"—using data-driven analysis to find undervalued assets—became a widely applied framework in business, healthcare, education, and public policy. The book was adapted into a major motion picture in 2011, starring Brad Pitt as Billy Beane, with a screenplay co-written by Aaron Sorkin and Steven Zaillian.

The Blind Side (2006)

Lewis's 2006 book The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game combined two narratives: the story of Michael Oher, a young African American man from a disadvantaged background in Memphis, Tennessee, who was adopted by a wealthy white family and went on to become a first-round NFL Draft pick as an offensive lineman; and a broader analysis of how the left tackle position had become one of the most valued in professional football due to its role in protecting the quarterback's blind side.

The Blind Side was Lewis's first book to be adapted into a film. The 2009 movie, also titled The Blind Side, starred Sandra Bullock, who won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her portrayal of Leigh Anne Tuohy, Michael Oher's adoptive mother. The film was a significant commercial success, grossing over $300 million worldwide.

The book and its film adaptation generated considerable public discussion about race, class, and charity in America. In later years, the story became the subject of controversy when Michael Oher filed legal proceedings against the Tuohy family, disputing aspects of the narrative as presented in both the book and the film.

The Big Short (2010)

The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine, published in 2010, examined the buildup to the financial crisis of 2007–2008 through the stories of several individuals who foresaw and profited from the collapse of the subprime mortgage market. The book focused on figures such as hedge fund manager Steve Eisman (fictionalized as Mark Baum in the later film adaptation), Michael Burry of Scion Capital, and traders at Cornwall Capital and FrontPoint Partners, who recognized the fragility of the mortgage-backed securities market and placed bets against it.

Lewis's account was notable for making the arcane world of collateralized debt obligations, credit default swaps, and structured finance accessible to a general readership. The book became a New York Times number-one bestseller.

The film adaptation, The Big Short, was released in 2015, directed by Adam McKay and featuring an ensemble cast including Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling, and Brad Pitt. The film received five Academy Award nominations and won the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay.

Flash Boys and The Undoing Project (2014–2016)

In 2014, Lewis published Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt, which investigated high-frequency trading and its impact on financial markets. The book centered on Brad Katsuyama, a trader at the Royal Bank of Canada, who discovered that high-frequency traders were using speed advantages to front-run orders from institutional investors, effectively skimming profits from ordinary trades. Katsuyama went on to co-found IEX, a stock exchange designed to neutralize the speed advantages exploited by high-frequency traders.

Flash Boys generated significant debate within the financial industry and among regulators about the fairness of modern market structure. Some critics within the trading industry disputed Lewis's characterization of high-frequency trading as inherently predatory, while others praised the book for drawing public attention to practices that had previously been poorly understood outside of professional finance circles.

In 2016, Lewis published The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds, which traced the intellectual partnership between Israeli psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky, whose work on cognitive biases and prospect theory had reshaped the fields of behavioral economics and decision theory. Lewis has noted that The Undoing Project had its origins in a question raised by a review of Moneyball—why were professional baseball scouts so consistently wrong in their evaluations of players? The answer, Lewis realized, lay in the cognitive biases that Kahneman and Tversky had identified and catalogued over decades of research.

The Fifth Risk, The Premonition, and Going Infinite (2018–2023)

Lewis continued to produce nonfiction works exploring institutions and systems under stress. The Fifth Risk (2018) examined the federal bureaucracy of the United States government and the risks posed by political neglect of agencies such as the Department of Energy, the Department of Agriculture, and the National Weather Service. The book argued that these agencies performed essential functions that were poorly understood by the public and vulnerable to disruption during political transitions.

In 2021, Lewis published The Premonition: A Pandemic Story, which told the story of public health officials and epidemiologists who had warned about the United States' unpreparedness for a pandemic long before the arrival of COVID-19. The book focused on figures within and outside government who had attempted to build systems for pandemic response and were frustrated by institutional inertia and political obstacles.

Lewis's most recent book, Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon (2023), examined the meteoric rise and dramatic collapse of Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX. Lewis had been granted extensive access to Bankman-Fried in the period leading up to FTX's implosion in November 2022, placing him in an unusual position as both a chronicler and, to some extent, a witness to the events he described. The book reached number one on The New York Times Best Seller list. Going Infinite was published shortly before Bankman-Fried's criminal trial and conviction on fraud charges, and it generated debate about Lewis's portrayal of his subject and the complexities of journalistic access.

Film Adaptations

Lewis's work has been unusually successful in attracting Hollywood adaptations. The Blind Side (2009), Moneyball (2011), and The Big Short (2015) were all major studio releases that achieved both commercial success and critical recognition. Reports have also indicated that Liar's Poker has been in various stages of film development.

The adaptations have been credited with bringing Lewis's explorations of complex financial and analytical topics to audiences far beyond the typical readership of nonfiction books. The Big Short in particular used innovative cinematic techniques—including breaking the fourth wall and inserting celebrity cameos to explain financial instruments—to make the causes of the 2008 financial crisis comprehensible to general audiences.

Personal Life

Lewis has been married twice. His first marriage was to Diane de Cordova Lewis; the couple married at Princeton in 1985. He later married former MTV correspondent and author Tabitha Soren. Lewis and Soren had three children together. The couple resided in Berkeley, California.

In May 2023, Lewis and Soren's eldest daughter, Dixie Lewis, was killed in a car accident in Truckee, California, at the age of 19, along with her boyfriend. The tragedy occurred while Lewis was in the final stages of completing Going Infinite.

Lewis has maintained his connection to New Orleans throughout his life, and the city and its culture have appeared as subjects and settings in his work. He has resided primarily in the San Francisco Bay Area for much of his adult life.

Recognition

Lewis's books have received numerous honors and accolades. His works have won two Los Angeles Times Book Prizes, and several of his titles have reached number one on The New York Times Best Seller list, including Moneyball, The Big Short, and Going Infinite.

Beyond book awards, Lewis has been recognized for his contributions to public understanding of finance, economics, and institutional behavior. His work has been credited with influencing how professional sports teams approach player evaluation (through Moneyball), how the public understands the causes of the 2008 financial crisis (through The Big Short), and how regulators and the public think about market structure and high-frequency trading (through Flash Boys).

Lewis has been a sought-after speaker and public intellectual, appearing on television programs, podcasts, and at conferences to discuss finance, economics, and the subjects of his books. In December 2025, he appeared in conversation with former U.S. Secretary of Labor Robert Reich, discussing his career and body of work.

His publisher relationships have included W. W. Norton & Company and Simon & Schuster.

Legacy

Michael Lewis has established a distinctive place in American letters as a writer who translates complex institutional, financial, and analytical subjects into compelling narrative nonfiction. His books have collectively sold millions of copies worldwide and have been translated into numerous languages. The three major film adaptations of his work—The Blind Side, Moneyball, and The Big Short—have further extended the reach of his ideas to global audiences.

Lewis's influence on the fields he has written about has been substantial. Moneyball accelerated the adoption of analytics across professional sports, with the term "moneyball" entering the broader lexicon as shorthand for data-driven decision-making. The Big Short provided what became for many readers and viewers the definitive narrative account of the 2008 financial crisis and the role of mortgage-backed securities in precipitating it. Flash Boys contributed to regulatory scrutiny of high-frequency trading and increased public awareness of the structure of modern financial markets.

His method—finding a human story at the center of a systemic phenomenon and using that story to make the phenomenon legible to non-specialists—has influenced a generation of nonfiction writers and journalists. Lewis has demonstrated that subjects often considered too technical or arcane for popular audiences, from bond trading to behavioral psychology to pandemic preparedness, can be made engaging through careful narrative construction and character-driven storytelling.

As of the mid-2020s, Lewis continues to write and engage publicly on issues of finance, economics, and institutional behavior. His career, spanning from the trading floors of 1980s Wall Street to the cryptocurrency collapses of the 2020s, has tracked many of the defining economic and cultural events of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries.