Curtis Sittenfeld has spent her career writing about love, marriage, and the messy realities of modern relationships. But it turns out her own marriage has been quietly unraveling, and the news is only now coming to light.
The bestselling author of Prep, American Wife, and Romantic Comedy married Matt Carlson, a professor of communications, in 2008. They built a life together in St. Louis before relocating to Minneapolis in 2018. They have two daughters together.
But according to recent updates to her public biography, Sittenfeld and Carlson split in 2025, and their marriage was officially over by 2026.
Here’s what we know about Curtis Sittenfeld’s husband and the quiet end of their nearly two-decade relationship.
Who Is Matt Carlson?
Matt Carlson is a professor of communications who has spent his career in academia. He and Sittenfeld married in 2008, when her debut novel Prep had already made her a literary sensation.
The couple settled in St. Louis, where Sittenfeld wrote many of her early novels, including American Wife and Sisterland. Their two daughters were born during this period. In 2018, the family moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota, where Sittenfeld continues to live and work. Her 2023 novel Romantic Comedy was written in Minneapolis, and she has spoken fondly of the city as her home base.
Carlson has kept an extremely low profile throughout their marriage. Unlike Sittenfeld, who has appeared on Fresh Air, PBS Newshour, and countless literary panels, Carlson has largely stayed out of the public eye. He is not active on social media, and the couple rarely appeared together at public events.
This was a deliberate choice. Sittenfeld has always guarded her family life closely, sharing only occasional details about her children and her domestic life. In interviews, she has described herself as a private person who happens to have a very public career.
The Marriage That Inspired Her Work
Sittenfeld’s fiction has always been preoccupied with the inner lives of women navigating love and ambition. From Prep‘s boarding school angst to Eligible‘s modern retelling of Pride and Prejudice to Rodham‘s alternate history of Hillary Clinton, her novels explore how women balance desire, duty, and selfhood.
Her own marriage, by all accounts, was a stable backdrop during a period of extraordinary productivity. Between 2008 and 2025, Sittenfeld published seven novels, a short story collection, and countless essays and articles. That kind of output requires a supportive domestic foundation, and Carlson appears to have provided that.
But in recent years, cracks began to show. In her 2023 novel Romantic Comedy, Sittenfeld wrote with unusual intimacy about the compromises of long-term relationships, the fear of settling, and the question of whether contentment is enough. The book was widely read as a departure for her, more personal and romantic than her earlier work.
Whether those themes reflected her own experience is impossible to say. Sittenfeld has never publicly discussed the reasons for her separation.
The Split
The timeline is straightforward, at least on paper.
Sittenfeld and Carlson separated in 2025, according to updated biographical records. Their divorce was finalized in 2026. The couple’s two daughters are now teenagers, and Sittenfeld continues to live in Minneapolis.
What is not clear is why the marriage ended. Neither Sittenfeld nor Carlson has commented publicly on the split. There have been no tabloid reports, no leaked court documents, no dramatic public statements. The end of their marriage has been as private as the marriage itself.
That is entirely consistent with how Sittenfeld has managed her personal life throughout her career. She has never been a celebrity in the tabloid sense. She is a literary novelist who happens to be famous enough to be recognized on the street but private enough to keep her family out of the spotlight.
What’s Next for Curtis Sittenfeld?
Sittenfeld’s career is as busy as ever. Her most recent book, a story collection titled Show Don’t Tell, was published in 2025 to strong reviews. She continues to write essays, teach, and appear at literary events.
Her daughters are growing up. Her marriage is over. And she is, by all appearances, moving forward.
For a writer whose entire body of work is about the complexity of women’s lives, this new chapter may prove to be her most compelling material yet. She has always written about endings and beginnings, about the moments when a life changes shape. Now she is living one.
The Bottom Line
Curtis Sittenfeld was married to Matt Carlson, a communications professor, for nearly two decades. They raised two daughters together. They built a life in St. Louis, then Minneapolis. And in 2025, they separated. By 2026, the marriage was officially over.
Sittenfeld has not spoken about it. Carlson has not spoken about it. The world only knows because the biographical record changed.
For a novelist who has spent her career examining the hidden textures of ordinary lives, that silence feels fitting. Some stories are not for public consumption. Some chapters are written just for the people who live them.
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