Sahar Mustafah

Sahar Mustafah is the daughter of Palestinian immigrants, an inheritance she explores in her fiction. Her debut novel The Beauty of Your Face was named a 2020 Notable Book and Editor’s Choice by New York Times Book Review and one of Marie Claire Magazine’s 2020 Best Fiction by Women. It was long-listed for the Center for Fiction 2020 First Novel Prize, and was a finalist for the Palestine Book Awards. Her short story “Star of Bethlehem” was awarded the Lawrence Prize for Best Fiction in 2022, and “Tree of Life” won the 2023 Robert J. DeMott Prize. Her recent fiction is featured in Stories from the Center of the World: New Middle East Fiction and 'The View from Gaza' published in The Massachusetts Review. She was awarded a 2023 Jack Hazard Fellowship from New Literary Project and an Illinois Arts Council Grant. Mustafah writes and teaches outside of Chicago.