Born in Northampton, England, in 1962, Mark Haddon made a successful career out of writing children's books before publishing The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time. In 1981, after receiving a bachelor's degree in English from Merton College, Oxford, Haddon held a variety of jobs, including several volunteer positions in which he helped people with physical and mental disabilities. A few years later, he returned to his studies to complete a master's degree in English Literature at Edinburgh University.

As a student at Edinburgh, he did illustrations for a number of magazines, and he has been a cartoonist for the New Statesman, Spectator, Private Eye, Sunday Telegraph, and The Guardian, where he co-wrote a cartoon strip, Men—A User's Guide.

In 1997, Haddon returned to England, where he won several awards for his involvement in a multitude of television projects, including two British Academy of Film and...