Huzama Habayeb is a Palestinian novelist, columnist, translator, and poet who was born and raised in Kuwait. She received her BA in English literature from Kuwait University in 1987 where she started writing poetry, short stories and journalistic articles. When the Gulf War erupted in 1990, Habayeb fled to Jordan with her family. There, she worked as a teacher and translator, and later established herself as a professional writer and a published author. Her early writings were mostly poetry, including the most notable collections “Images” (1990) and “Begging” (اسْتِجْداء) (2009). Habayeb also gained fame as a short story writer. Her debut collection “The Man Who Recurs” (الرَّجُل الذي يَتَكرَّر) received the Jerusalem Festival of Youth Innovation in Short Stories Award in 1992. Her second collection was awarded the Mahmoud Seif Eddine Al -Erani Award in Jordan in 1994. As a novelist, Habayeb’s first novel “Roots of Passion” (أصْل الهَوَى) was published in 2007 and gained wide critical acclaim. Her third novel, “Velvet” (مُخْمَل), published in 2016, examines the struggles of life in a Palestinian refugee camp. The novel, widely celebrated, won the Naguib Mahfouz Medal for Literature in 2017 and was translated into English by Hoopoe Fiction.