Malcolm Gay is an arts reporter for The Boston Globe, where he covers visual and performing arts. He previously worked as a contributing writer at The New York Times, and his writing has also appeared in Wired, The Atlantic, and TIME magazine, among other publications.

In 2004, the Society of Professional Journalists, Northern California Chapter, named him that year's “Outstanding Emerging Journalist,” and in 2005 he received the James Beard Award for Nutrition or Food-Related Consumer Issues. His work has since received several other accolades, including top honors in 2008 from the Association of Alternative Newsweeklies and in 2009 from the National Association of Black Journalists. In 2010 he was awarded the Woodward-Bernstein Award from the Missouri Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. He was named an Alicia Patterson Fellow in 2013.

The Brain Electric, which details the race to merge the mind with machines, is his first book.