Monica Ali

1967-

Monica Ali was born in Dhaka, in 1967, and came with her parents to England when she was 3. Her mother is English and her father Bangladeshi. She grew up in Bolton but has spent most of her life in London. She attended Bolton Girls' School and Wadham College, Oxford. She is married to a management consultant. She worked in publishing and design before having their two children. She started to write during the brief periods when her son and daughter were both asleep.

She has been named one of Granta's "Best Young British Novelists" in 2003. At that time her book Brick Lane hadn't even been finished. The former Oxford student secured a 200,000 Pounds advance on the strength of the first six chapters of her book.    

Monica Ali,  has been included on the "long list" for the Booker Prize for her first novel. The book, Brick Lane which tells the story of a Bangladeshi girl sent to London to be married, is one of 23 titles chosen from 117 entries in contention for the Britain's most prestigious annual fiction award worth £50,000 prize. The shortlist of six will be announced at a ceremony at the British Museum on October 14, 2003.     Her first novel, Brick Lane was originally published in Great Britain by Doubleday in the summer of 2003, and First Scribner Edition 2003 in USA.