Tom McAllister Books in Order

If you want the personal nonfiction entry point: Bury Me in My Jersey
If you want grief, humor, and a road-trip novel: The Young Widower's Handbook
If you want his darkest, angriest fiction: How to Be Safe
If you want a simple reading path: Bury Me in My Jersey → The Young Widower's Handbook → How to Be Safe

Tom McAllister grew up in Philadelphia, in the Roxborough section of the city, and he has stayed close to that world in both life and work. He graduated from La Salle University, then went to the Iowa Writers' Workshop for his MFA. He has said that Iowa helped him see what a serious writing life looked like, not just on the page but in the day-to-day habits around it.

Philly never really leaves his books.

That shows up most clearly in Bury Me in My Jersey, his first book. On the surface it's a memoir about the Eagles and the strange intensity of sports fandom. Underneath, it's about a son trying to understand his father, a family dealing with grief, and a young writer learning that obsession can sometimes become material. McAllister has talked about being urged to write toward the things he couldn't stop thinking about, and football, family, and loss turned out to be right at the center.

The appeal of his work is that it rarely stays in one lane for long. Bury Me in My Jersey is funny, but it is also sad and self-questioning. The Young Widower's Handbook begins with a devastating loss, then follows Hunter Cady as he stumbles through early grief with his late wife's ashes beside him. How to Be Safe moves into darker territory, following teacher Anna Crawford after a school shooting turns her into part of a public story she did not choose.

He likes characters who are a little adrift.

That may be why his books feel so readable even when the subject matter is heavy. His people are often sons, spouses, teachers, or ordinary working adults who are trying to act normal while their lives tilt sideways. He writes a lot about the gap between public performance and private panic. He also returns again and again to place, especially Philadelphia and South Jersey, where neighborhood loyalties, class signals, sports culture, and family memory all carry real weight.

Before the books, McAllister built his career piece by piece through essays, short stories, editing, and teaching. His short work has appeared widely, and his story "Things You're Not Proud of" was selected for The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2015. He became part of the literary community around Barrelhouse as a nonfiction editor, and for years he was also a steady, funny presence as a co-host of the Book Fight! podcast, talking about books without turning the conversation stiff or precious.

Teaching has been a big part of his writing life, too. He spent many years at Temple University, where he taught in the English Department. In 2024 he moved to Rutgers University-Camden as an assistant teaching professor, where he teaches undergraduates and MFA students. That mix of classroom work, editing, and publishing helps explain why his books feel connected to the real world instead of sealed off from it.

What readers often like most is his tone. He can be dry, warm, irritated, observant, and very funny, sometimes in the same paragraph. Even when he writes about grief, fear, or public violence, he keeps his attention on how people actually talk, misread each other, spiral, joke, and keep going.

McAllister lives in South Jersey, just outside Philadelphia, with his wife. He still writes across fiction and nonfiction, and his work keeps circling back to a few familiar questions: how people carry loss, how identity gets shaped by place, and how ordinary lives get bent by the stories a culture tells about gender, sports, safety, and success. Big subjects, yes, but he usually gets at them through one voice, one neighborhood, one awkward moment at a time.