Caleb Nolen was born in Wisconsin and grew up in Pennsylvania and Maryland. He has received support from Blue Mountain Center and Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, where he was a work-study scholar. Caleb is a graduate of St. John’s College in Annapolis and completed his MFA at the University of Virginia. He and his wife live in the Shenandoah Valley.

In addition to writing, Caleb is a volunteer with The Catherine Project, a free community of learning, where he leads reading groups and tutorials on philosophy and literature.