保羅•哈丁，美國作傢、音樂傢。他少年時代經常“在叢林中遊蕩”，對大自然有著深切的愛和體悟。後參與創建“Cold Water Flat”樂隊，擔任鼓手，曾在美國和歐洲巡迴演齣。他從小酷愛閱讀。當讀到卡洛斯•富恩特斯的《我們的土地》時，他突然感到“這纔是我要做的事”，從此萌發文學創作之念。他的首部小說《修補匠》原本默默無聞，卻憑藉其厚積薄發的文學內涵獲得2010年普利策小說奬。

“This compact, adamantine début dips in and out of the consciousness of a New England patriarch named George Washington Crosby as he lies dying on a hospital bed in his living room, ‘right where they put the dining room table, fitted with its two extra leaves for holiday dinners’…In Harding’s skillful evocation, Crosby’s life, seen from its final moments, becomes a mosaic of memories, ‘showing him a different self every time he tried to make an assessment.’”— The New Yorker “Harding’s interest is in the universalities: nature and time and the murky character of memory…The small, important recollections are rendered with an exactitude that is poetic…Harding's prose is lyrical and specific...Tinkers is a poignant exploration of where we may journey when the clock has barely a tick or two left and we really can’t go anywhere at all.”— The Boston Globe “ Tinkers is truly remarkable… It confers on the reader the best privilege fiction can afford, the illusion of ghostly proximity to other human souls.”— Marilynne Robinson , Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Home and Gilead “In astounding language sometimes seemingly struck by lightning, sometimes as tight and complicated as clockwork, Harding shows how enormous fiction can be, and how economical. Read this book and marvel.”— Elizabeth McCracken , author of Niagara Falls All Over Again “Tinkers is a remarkable piece of work…fascinating—and sometimes horrific—to read, and is cumulatively moving because it is woven together into the single quilt of our humanity.”— Barry Unsworth , Booker Prize–winning author of The Ruby in Her Navel An old man lies dying. As time collapses into memory, he travels deep into his past where he is reunited with his father and relives the wonder and pain of his impoverished New England youth. At once heartbreaking and life affirming, Tinkers is an elegiac meditation on love, loss, and the fierce beauty of nature. Paul Harding has an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and teaches creative writing at Harvard. He lives in Georgetown, Massachusetts.