T. Kudla (author name of Thom Kudla/Thomas Kudla) is a prolific, award-winning poet and author who has written and published more than 20 books. T. Kudla is a three-time IndieReader Discovery Award Winner, including the latest win in the 2025 Poetry (Fiction) category for WAKING UP AT THE GATES: POEMS OF RECOVERY, HEALING, & TRANSFORMATION. In addition, Kudla’s latest memoir, FROM MADNESS TO MAD PRIDE, was recognized as a category finalist in the 2025 Eric Hoffer Book Awards.
Kudla’s book HOW I AM DIFFERENT was named a finalist in the Poetry Category of the 2017 Next Generation Indie Book Awards. The ebook version won multiple medals in the 2017 Global Ebook Awards. HOW WE ARE DIFFERENT (HWAD), an Apple app based on that book, earned two gold medals in the 2018 eLit Book Awards and was recognized by the IBPA as a Benjamin Franklin Digital Award Silver Honoree.
Kudla’s earlier books of poetry COMMENCEMENT and OUT OF CONTEXT won the 2017 IndieReader Discovery Award for Poetry. Kudla’s first memoir, WHAT MY BRAIN TOLD ME, was selected as a finalist in the short story non-fiction category of the 2009 National Indie Excellence Awards. Kudla’s writing was anthologized in many books, including CHICAGO AFTER DARK and SILVER: AN ECLECTIC ANTHOLOGY OF POETRY & PROSE.
T. Kudla earned a Master of Arts in Writing and Publishing from DePaul University and a bachelor's from Indiana University, Bloomington, concluding those studies by being awarded a grant to write a debut novel. Kudla also attained an NYU Filmmaking Certificate.