Samira Ahmed author page

Samira Ahmed biography

Samira Ahmed was born in Bombay, India, and grew up in Batavia, Illinois. She is a graduate of the University of Chicago. Before publishing novels, she taught high school English, helped create dozens of small high schools, and worked on campaigns for fairer public-school funding. Her debut novel, Love, Hate & Other Filters, was published on 16 January 2018, and it won the Society of Midland Authors Literary Award in Children’s Fiction.

She went on to write Internment, and later published Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know, Hollow Fires, This Book Won’t Burn, and The Singular Life of Aria Patel. Her middle-grade fantasy sequence includes Amira & Hamza: The War to Save the Worlds and Amira & Hamza: The Quest for the Ring of Power. Hollow Fires was published on 10 May 2022, This Book Won’t Burn on 7 May 2024, and The Singular Life of Aria Patel on 13 May 2025.