The prose writer Tomáš Zmeškal (born 1966 in Prague) studied English language and literature. He works as a secondary-school teacher of English literature. Although he had earlier published short stories, he came to attention mainly through his first novel, Milostný dopis klínovým písmem, which describes the post-war world of 1950s Czechoslovakia from a postmodern fragmented perspective.
The book Milostný dopis klínovým písmem was awarded the Josef Škvorecký Prize in 2009 and the European Union Prize for Literature in 2011. In the same year he published his second novel, Životopis černobílého jehněte.