Lethem may be the closest thing to a heartthrob the New York literary world's got.

Raised in Boerum Hill—the nabe that would serve as the setting for The Fortress of Solitude and Motherless Brooklyn—Jonathan attended the High School for Music and Art before earning an art scholarship to Bennington. But he ended up dropping out of college during his sophomore year, moving to the San Francisco Bay area, and in 1994, he published his first novel, the sci-fi-meets-Raymond-Chandler tale Gun, With Occasional Music. Three more sci-fi-ish novels followed, attracting a dedicated cult fanbase, but his breakout didn't come along until 1999 when the author, who'd moved back to New York, released Motherless Brooklyn, narrated by a Tourette's-suffering apprentice hoodlum named Lionel Essrog. The book won the National Book Critic's Circle Award and earned Lethem swift billing as the Next Big Thing. He followed up with the semi-autobiographical The Fortress of Solitude in 2003. In 2005 he was awarded a MacArthur "genius grant," cementing his status as New York's literary golden boy. He's since diversified from his novels, writing pieces of non-fiction like They Live and Talking Heads' Fear of Music and even a comic book, Omega the Unknown. [Image via Getty]