Jacobs received his B.A. in 1974 from Alma College in Michigan, as well as a Masters in International Administration (1980) from the School for International Training in Vermont. He received his Ph.D. in English from Drew University in New Jersey in 1987.

He served in the Peace Corps (Paraguay, 1978-1980), and his first published story, set in Peru, appeared in 1980. He joined the U.S. Foreign Service in 1984 and returned to Paraguay, while also serving tours in Bolivia, Spain and Turkey. At the U.S. State Department, he organized Writers on America, a book of essays in which he, Robert Pinsky, Robert Creeley and others discussed the experience of being an American writer, in order to express a more nuanced sense of what American society is like. More than 50,000 copies of the collection have been distributed around the world, and it has been translated into seven languages. He occasionally teaches the art of prose at writing conferences at Drew University.

Most of his books and more than seventy published short stories deal with international intrigue and the interplay between Americans and foreign cultures. Fellow Peace Corps volunteer, musician and former Texas gubernatorial candidate Kinky Friedman once said that “if John le Carré were an American, his name would be Mark Jacobs.” Drew University Conference Director Robert Ready is quoted as saying, "One would be hard pressed to find someone to match Mark in the creation of characters...characters of variety and depth. It also would be difficult to match him in variety of circumstances and places." At the same time, Huey Alcaro notes, "Mark frequently works with a particular group of people, lost and found souls. They may have temporarily lost their way, or been wandering for years. They lose or find themselves in home territory or a foreign land. They find what is needed in the familiar or completely alien. They capture our attention. They could be us."

Forty Wolves, Talisman HouseA Handful of Kings, Simon and Schuster The Liberation of Little Heaven, Soho Press Stone Cowboy, a novel, Soho Press; Great Britain, CanongateA Cast of Spaniards, Talisman House

“Weightlifting for Catholics,” The Atlantic“Stone Cowboy on the High Plains,” The Atlantic“How Birds Communicate,” The Iowa Review"White Cloud," The Southern Review“Perfect Rush,” The Southwest Review“Singing in a Foreign Land,” Reconfigurations“Last Word,” The Idaho Review“ The Emperor’s Cat,” Reconfigurations“ My Letter to Sandy,” Reconfigurations“Dog in the Hole,” Idaho Review“Dog Love & Beyond,” Louisiana Literature“Spring Cleaning,” Webster Review“The Ballad of Tony Nail,” Crucible"Deer," Crucible“Old Sneakers and the Idea of No,” Pig Iron“Love in the Gash,” Pikeville Review“The Question,” Pig Iron“The Significance of Doing,” Farmer’s Market“Down in Paraguay,” Buffalo Spree Magazine“Sixto in Harvest,” Farmer’s Market“The Senator’s Left Eye,” Crucible“Act of Contrition,” Buffalo Spree Magazine“The Necessary Plane,” The Sun“The Albino Pheasant,” Kiosk“Eusebio’s Spaniard,” Buffalo Spree Magazine“Little Bird’s Indian,” Farmer’s Market“The Murder of German Morales,” Nebraska Review“A Father’s Tale,” Buffalo Spree Magazine“The Agent,” Webster Review“Susy’s Lucy and the Big Dream Parrot,” International Quarterly“Lover’s Leap,” North Dakota Quarterly“101 on the Edge,” Buffalo Spree Magazine“How the World Began, For Real,” Kiosk“The Spam Letters,” Owen Wister Review“Endchase,” Buffalo Spree Magazine“Perfect Crime,” Buffalo Spree Magazine“Morality Play,” The Journal“Planting the Flag,” New Delta Review“Solidarity in Green,” The Southern Review“Fool’s Progress,” Red Cedar Review“Me, the Horseman,” Kiosk“The Egg Queen Rises,” Buffalo Spree Magazine; anthologized in Living on the Edge, an anthology published by Curbstone Press, 1999“The Rape of Reason,” North Dakota Quarterly“Heart,” Nebraska Review“The Lifestyle Implants Caper,” Beloit Fiction Journal“Mengele Dies Again,” The American Literary Review“Amelia Questing,” The Belletrist Review“Virtually Yours,” The Southwest Review“The Way Grass Can Smell,” New Delta Review“Consular Affair,” New Letters“You and Me and the New Me,” North Dakota Quarterly“After the War Was Over,” The Southern Review“Dove of the Back Streets,” Kenyon Review“Malaria,” The Southern Review“Looking for Lourdes,” The American Literary Review“Confidence in Izmir,” The Southwest Review“Two Dead Indians,” Kiosk“The Liberation of Little Heaven,” The American Literary Review"Uncle Joe's Old Time Communist Nostalgia Bar," The Southern Review"In the City of X," The Southern Review“The Real Reason I Went to Nicaragua,” The Nebraska Review“Mysterious Way,” North Dakota Quarterly"Cholera," Crab Orchard Review"The Acrobat's Wife," The American Literary Review"In Vienna, In Glass," The Southern Review"Meat Eater," Green Mountains Review"The Woman Who Couldn't Sleep," The Nebraska Review"Spanish Summer," North Dakota Quarterly"Thirsty Deer," South West Review"Shooting to Kill," American Literary Review“Witness Protection,” Southern Review“Churoquella,” Green Hills Literary Lantern

“What Creeley Knew,” Talisman“Redrawing the Line: Gertrude Himmelfarb’s On Looking into the Abyss” (an essay), International Quarterly“Think of It as a Blackbird,” Foreign Service Journal“Both Sides of the Border,” in Writers on America; republished in World View Magazine“ A Serious Conversation,” in CounterPunch“ Writing American,” in Peace Corps Writers

1998 Iowa Review Fiction Award for "How Birds Communicate"1998 Crucible Prize for Fiction for "Deer"1997 Crucible Prize for Fiction for “The Ballad of Tony Nail”1994 Eyster Prize for Prose for "Planting the Flag"