About the Author - David Benjamin

David Benjamin has a lifetime of stories to tell, dates all the way back to Mrs. Poss’ second-grade class at St. Mary’s School in Tomah, Wis.

Since then, Benjamin has become the author of an eclectic range of both fiction and non-fiction and the founder in 2019 of his own publishing imprint, Last Kid Books. His publishing concern is the namesake of Benjamin’s fictional memoir, The Life and Times of the Last Kid Picked, originally published by Random House and reprinted in a 2020 revised version by Last Kid Books.

In its first five years, Last Kid Books’ wide-ranging catalog of titles have garnered more than thirty awards for literary excellence, in a dozen-plus genres, from independent publishing organizations. Among these honors is the 2021 grand prize for literary/historical and contemporary fiction in  the Midwest Book Awards for They Shot Kennedy, and a Silver Medal in the category of humor for Fat Vinny’s Forbidden Love in the Independent Book Publishers Association’s prestigious Benjamin Franklin Awards.

Books published under Benjamin’s imprint since its founding in 2019 are all listed, summarized and available at www.lastkidooks.com.

Benjamin’s lively explanation of sumo wrestling, under the Tuttle Publishing imprint, SUMO: A Thinking Fan’s Guide to Japan’s National Sport, has been continuously in print since 1990.

In his journalism career, Benjamin has been editor of the Mansfield (Mass.) News, where he earned nine awards for editorial excellence, and Tokyo Journal in Japan. He was a columnist, in Tokyo, for the Japan Times Weekly, the Mainichi Daily News and the weekly Shukan Bunshun.

Benjamin’s essays have appeared in a broad range of national periodicals including the New York Times. Philadelphia Inquirer, San Francisco Examiner, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Wisconsin State Journal, Capital Times and EE Times.