Kamila Shamsie

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Kamila Shamsie (b. 1973) is a Pakistani novelist, who writes in the English language. She was brought up in Karachi and attended Karachi Grammar School.

She has a BA in Creative Writing from Hamilton College, and an MFA from the MFA Program for Poets & Writers at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Kamila wrote her first novel, In The City By The Sea, while she was still at UMass, and it was published in both India and England in 1998. It was soon shortlisted for the 'John Llewelyn Rhys/Mail on Sunday award in the UK', and she received the Prime Minister's Award for Literature in Pakistan in 1999. Her second novel, Salt and Saffron, followed up on her success, and was published in the United States, the United Kingdom, Pakistan and Italy. in 2000 she was selected as one of Orange's 21 Writers of the 21st Century. Her third novel, Kartography, received widespread critical acclaim and was shortlisted for the John Llewelyn Rhys award in the UK. Both "Kartography" and her most recent work, Broken Verses have won the Patras Bukhari Award from the Academy of Letters in Pakistan.

She is the daughter of the famous literary journalist, compiler and editor Muneeza Shamsie and granddaughter of the writer, Begum Jahanara Habibullah.