Isabella Hammad was born in London and lives between London and New York. Her first novel, The Parisian, won a 2019 Palestine Book Award, the 2020 Sue Kaufman Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and a Betty Trask Award from the Society of Authors in the UK. She was awarded the 2018 Plimpton Prize for Fiction and a 2019 O. Henry Prize for her short story “Mr Can’aan,” and in 2019 she was a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree. She is currently at work on a new novel set in London and Palestine