Author Jacqueline Mitchard, author of The Deep End of the Ocean and other novels, calls the Madison area home. She got her start as a columnist for the Capital Times , the afternoon newspaper. A collection of her newspaper columns is available in the book The Rest of Us.

While he now lives on the East Coast, Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Maraniss grew up in Madison. Maraniss' They Marched Into Sunlight features a significant amount of discussion of the anti-war movement on campus at the University of Wisconsin during the 1960s. He is also famous for biographies of Bill Clinton and legendary Packers coach Vince Lombardi.

Double Take: A Rephotographic Survey of Madison, Wisconsin, is a collection of "rephotographs" of Madison by locally-acclaimed photographer Zane Williams. The recent black-and-white photos replicate those taken in the 1920s-1950s by local photo-historian, Angus McVicar. Williams' photos are placed side-by-side with McVicar's, exhibiting the changes of the past 50+ years in this growing city. 

Pulitzer Prize-winning author, Wallace Stenger who once lived in Madison, set his final novel (1987) in Madison.  Crossing to Safety, follows two young couples over the course of a lifetime and discovers truths about friendship, ambition and talent that are moving and memorable.

Stuart Levitan has taken on the task of illuminating Madison's early history in his book, Madison: The Illustrated Sesquicentennial History, Volume 1, 1856-1931. The book examines the ideas and influences of the people who helped shape the city in its formative years.

Madison is a rarity as a two-newspaper town. The morning paper, the Wisconsin State Journal , is the larger of the two and is the more conservative. The Capital Times is the afternoon paper, and is one of the most liberal (they would prefer the term "progressive") papers in the country. It also has more of a local focus than the State Journal. The UW also boasts two papers: the Daily Cardinal and Badger Herald.The Simpson Street Free Press is an innovative free paper written by local teenagers. Madison also features free papers Isthmus and The Madison Times. There are also several free magazines in the area, including Wisconsin Woman. And while its offices are now in New York, the satirical paper The Onion got its start in Madison; the latest copy can be found for free all over town.