Sheba Karim is the author of the novels Skunk Girl, That Thing We Call a Heart and Mariam Sharma Hits the Road. Mariam Sharma Hits the Road, which follows the misadventures of three South Asian-American best friends as they embark upon a road trip through the American South, was named an NPR Best Book of 2018. That Thing We Call a Heart, in which a young woman’s explorations of loyalty and love is informed by the evocative metaphors of Urdu poetry and the history of Partition, was named a Best Contemporary Teen Read of 2017 and a Best Teen Book of 2017 with a Touch of Humor by Kirkus Reviews, an Amelia Bloomer Best Feminist Book for Young Readers by the American Library Association and a Bank Street Best Book of the Year. She is the editor of the anthology Alchemy: The Tranquebar Book of Erotic Short Stories 2 (Tranquebar Press, 2012). Her writing has been featured in 580 Split, Asia Literary Review, Femina, India Today, Literary Hub, Off Assignment, Shenandoah, South Asian Review, The Rumpus, Time Out Delhi and in several anthologies in the United States and India.
She has an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and has been awarded residencies at Hedgebrook, Ledig House, Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts and The Millay Colony for the Arts. She is represented by Ayesha Pande Literary. Her fourth young adult novel, set in New Delhi, is forthcoming from Harper Collins in 2020.
Sheba was raised in the land of Rip Van Winkle, spent a long time living in New York City, a shorter time living in New Delhi and is now based in Nashville, TN, where she is a Writer-in-Residence at Vanderbilt University.
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