Tom Butler-Bowdon is an expert on the "literature of possibility", covering self-help, motivation, spirituality, prosperity, psychology and philosophy. USA Today described him as "a true scholar of this type of literature". His first book, 50 Self-Help Classics, won the Benjamin Franklin Award and was a Foreword magazine Book of the Year.

The 50 Classics series has sold over 400,000 copies and has been published in 23 languages.

A graduate of the London School of Economics and the University of Sydney, he lives in Oxford, UK, and Australia.