Sofia Samatar is a writer of fiction and nonfiction, including the memoir The White Mosque, a PEN/Jean Stein Award finalist. Her works range from the World Fantasy Award-winning novel A Stranger in Olondria to Opacities: On Writing and the Writing Life, a National Book Critics Circle Award Longlist selection. Her 2024 novella The Practice, the Horizon, and the Chain was a finalist for the Philip K. Dick, Nebula, and Hugo Awards. Samatar is Roop Distinguished Professor of English at James Madison University, where she teaches African literature, Arabic literature, and speculative fiction.