He earned his Ph.D. in Spanish Language and Literature from Vanderbilt University in Nashville in 2011, with a dissertation on Spanish and British 16th- and 17th-century criminal literature. His fields of interest also include Spanish literature from the 19th and 20th centuries written in any language of the Iberian Peninsula, as well as children's literature and film studies. In his free time, he enjoys listening to and writing about jazz, as well as collecting vintage jazz records.