Benjamin Markovits was born in California in 1973 and grew up in Texas. He read English at Yale and Oxford. After playing a season of professional basketball for a German team he spent a year teaching at a high school in New York. His first novel, The Syme Papers, was published in 2004. Now a lecturer in creative writing at the University of London, Markovits lives in the city with his wife and daughter. A Quiet Adjustment is the second part of his Byron trilogy, and is out now.

What is the last thing you read that made you laugh out loud?