Worked as a professor at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) and as a visiting professor at Yale University, Boston University and the Universidad Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona. He has been awarded the Premio Villaurrutia for his book of short fiction La casa pierde (1999), the Premio Herralde for his novel El testigo (2004), the Premio Internacional Manuel Vázquez Montalbán for his book of soccer chronicles Dios es Redondo (2006) and the Premio Antonin Artaud for his book of short stories Los culpables (2007). From 1995 to 1998 he was the director of the Jornada Semanal, the cultural supplement for the newspaper La Jornada. He currently has a column in the newspaper El Reforma and in the Periódico de Catalunya. Among his other books in print are: El disparo de argón, the compilation of articles Safari accidental, the book of essays De eso se trata and the novel El libro salvaje.