About Me / About the Site

My name is Zach Mann. I’m from Venice, the Venice of America, that piece of dug up beach just south of Bay City, back when Philip Marlowe used to the roam the streets of Hollywoodland. I grew up in the nineties, hating the nineties, watching seventies and eighties science-fiction, playing baseball by day and Dungeons and Dragons by night. I dreamed of becoming a professional baseball player and a professional writer, and then I grew up. Now I don’t play baseball anymore and I continue to chase the one dream that’s left, before it, too, breaks down in the face of gravity and age.

Having grown up as jock-geek, or a fighter-wizard (to use a different colloquialism), I’ve always considered myself a man of many talents. Though in truth its historically meant that I’ve spread myself too thin, having dabbled in so many hobbies that I’ve become adequate at many and good at none. Likewise, I’m 27 years old and not a professional anything. So in lieu of success I’m building a website, pasting together my many mediocre projects into one warehouse, located at the address http://www.zmmann.com. And trust me, if I had any footage of myself playing baseball, I’d probably include that, too.

After growing up with science-fiction/fantasy, reading epic yarns and trying to be the next Michael Whelan, I became obsessed with literature in college and Russian culture (Dostoevsky). After studying abroad in Moscow I fell in love with early nineteenth century American lit, specifically John Dos Passos, and ultimately crime fiction, a mixture of Raymond Chandler, David Goodis and films noir. The end result is a mixed interest in books, movies and cultural exploration that I’ve yet to truly figure out how to express. I’m still working on it.

I currently live in San Francisco and work from home.

The above photograph was taken in Murmansk, Russia, by photographer Natalia Melikova.

This page is under construction…