Clint McCown was born in Fayetteville, Tennessee, a town destroyed by a tornado the week of his birth. Twice winner of the American Fiction Prize, he has written four novels, and his short stories, essays, and poems have appeared widely. His books include the novel HAINTS (New Rivers Press, 2012), and the poetry collection DEAD LANGUAGES (Anhinga Press, 2008). He teaches in the MFA program at Virginia Commonwealth University and in the Vermont College of Fine Arts low-residency MFA program. He is a former actor with the National Shakespeare Company and the Puerto Rican Traveling Theatre. Several of his plays have been produced, and he has worked as both a screenwriter for Warner Bros. and a creative consultant for HBO television. As a journalist, he received the AP Award for Documentary Excellence for his investigations of organized crime.

He lives on a horse farm in Virginia.