Masha Hamilton is the author of four acclaimed novels, most recently 31 Hours, which The Washington Post called one of the best novels of 2009, and independent bookstores named an Indiebound Indie Next List choice.
She also founded two world literacy projects, the Camel Book Drive and the Afghan Women's Writing Project.
She is the winner of the 2010 Women's National Book Association award, presented "to a living American woman who derives part or all of her income from books and allied arts, and who has done meritorious work in the world of books beyond the duties or responsibilities of her profession or occupation."
She began her career as a full-time journalist, working in Maine, Indiana, and New York City before being sent by the Associated Press to the Middle East where she was news editor for five years, including the period of the first intifada. She then moved to Moscow where she worked for five years during the collapse of Communism, reporting for the Los Angeles Times and NBC-Mutual Radio and writing a monthly column, "Postcards from Moscow." She also reported from Kenya in 2006, and from Afghanistan in 2004 and 2008.
A Brown University graduate, Hamilton has been awarded fiction fellowships from Yaddo, Blue Mountain Center, Squaw Valley Community of Writers and the Arizona Commission on the Arts. She has taught for Gotham Writers Workshop and the 92nd Street Y in New York City and at a number of writers' workshops around the country. She has also taught in Afghanistan at Kabul University.
She is currently the director of communications and public diplomacy for the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan.
"Engaging....Straddling two lands while depicting the strength of
human relationships even in the darkest moments, this seamless
blend of fact and fiction through illuminating prose makes the
story a rewarding and thought-provoking read."
--Publishers Weekly "Hamilton's descriptions are vivid, especially
when portraying the tension and uncertainty that families of
political prisoners endure. Fans of topical fiction will appreciate
this knowledgeable and nuanced view of the Afghan war."
--Library Journal "Journalist-turned-novelist Masha Hamilton has
produced a new novel in her trademark vein, with harrowing crisis,
conflict and dilemma, and deep psychological probing of self."
--THE WASHINGTON INDEPENDENT REVIEW OF BOOKS "Every once in a
while, a book comes along that makes you want to wrest even your
own work from readers' hands and command that they instead read
this. Masha Hamilton's What Changes Everything is that kind of
amazing."
--Ms Magazine "Intensely gripping and beautifully written, What
Changes Everything shows the lengths we will go to to save each
other and ourselves. A stunning collage of loss, grief, love, and
most of all, survival, Hamilton's characters - and their stories -
are richly drawn and achingly real."
--Jillian Cantor, author of Margot "Quite simply stunning. Every
once in a while, a book comes along that makes you want to wrest
even your own work from readers' hands and command that they
instead read this. Masha Hamilton's What Changes Everything is that
kind of amazing. Hamilton knows the surreal world that is present
day Afghanistan firsthand, and she delivers the grief and love that
world spills into our own with pace, grace, and--perhaps most
surprisingly--humor. I held my breath through a kidnapping, and at
women stepping beyond the boundaries allowed them, into the kind of
danger that is necessary for change. I fell in love, improbably,
with an Afghani aide-turned-negotiator and an American wielding
spray paint in dark places on dark nights. I at turns laughed and
cried at a mother's attempts, through letters, to gain her son's
death the attention it deserves. In the end, I felt I understood
some truth I had not brought with me to the book, and I felt
uplifted, and hopeful that writing like this might, in fact, be a
step toward changing everything."
--Meg Waite Clayton (best-selling author of "The Four Ms.
Bradwells", "The Wednesday Sisters", and "The Language of Light")
"What Changes Everything shows us the dance of war in all its
heartbreaking details, weaving into the most secret places in the
human heart. Her story shows what we lose in war, and how we get to
the other side of survival. Masha Hamilton is such a gifted
writer."
--Laura Fitzgerald, author of Dreaming in English "As real and
immediate as a racing pulse, Hamilton's dark jewel of a novel turns
the political into the personal with a blazing tapestry of
characters, all grappling with the terrifying cost of war and the
unbreakable bonds of love. Thrilling and magnificent."
--Caroline Leavitt, New York Times best-selling author of Pictures
of You
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