About

Meet the Author

Sabaa Tahir

SHORT BIO

SABAA TAHIR is a former newspaper editor who grew up in California’s Mojave Desert at her family’s eighteen-room motel. There, she spent her time devouring fantasy novels, listening to thunderous indie rock, and playing guitar and piano badly. Her #1 New York Times bestselling An Ember in the Ashes series has been translated into more than thirty-five languages, and the first book in the series was named one of TIME’s 100 Best Young Adult Books of All Time. Tahir’s most recent novel, All My Rage, won the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature, the Michael L. Printz Award, the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award for Fiction and Poetry.

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“ Tahir proves to be a master of suspense and a canny practitioner of the cliffhanger ”

-Booklist, Starred Review

Full Bio

#1 New York Times and International Bestseller
National Book Award Winner
Michael L. Printz Award Winner
Boston Globe Horn Book Award Winner
Amelia Elizabeth Walden Award Winner
Ignyte Award Winner
TIME’s 100 Best Young Adult Books of All Time
TIME’s 100 Best Fantasy Books of All Time

SABAA TAHIR began telling tales as a child growing up in California—and never stopped. Her parents ran a small, 18-room motel in the Mojave Desert, where Sabaa spent a great deal of time listening to and observing the stories of the tenants who passed through. Along with her two older brothers, Sabaa was one of a very small number of South Asian immigrants in the town. Her experiences growing up in a place of such isolation and extremes inform much of her work. 

After college, Sabaa began working as a copy editor at the Washington Post’s foreign news desk. There, the stories she read about extrajudicial jailings, child soldiers, genocide, and colonial occupations informed the beginnings of what would become her landmark series, the Ember quartet. She published An Ember in the Ashes in 2015, followed by three further books in the series: A Torch Against the Night, A Reaper at the Gates and A Sky Beyond the Storm. In the process, Sabaa became the first Pakistani-American fantasist to hit Number 1 on the New York Times Bestseller List. 

In 2022, Sabaa took a break from fantasy and turned to Young Adult contemporary, completing a book she had been working on for approximately fifteen years. That book, All My Rage, was inspired by her childhood in the desert. It garnered eight starred reviews, the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature, the Michael L. Printz Award, the Amelia Elizabeth Walden Award, the Boston Globe Horn Book Award, and a Walter honor, along with numerous other accolades and firsts. 

After stepping away from fantasy, Sabaa published Heir in 2024. It is a return to the world of Ember but with a new cast of characters. Heir was chosen as the inaugural pick for Good Morning America’s YA Book Club, garnered five starred reviews, and won the Ignyte Award for Best YA Fantasy, as well as the Libby Award for best young adult novel. 

Some of Sabaa’s favorite pastimes are: singing along to thunderous indie rock; learning her teenagers slang and trolling them with it; wearing and giving garish socks; perfecting her chocolate chip cookie recipe; spending time with her beloved cat Samothrace; and avoiding any and all forms of sports.   

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