We kick off The Candid Book Club Festival with a fabulous debut panel featuring first time authors Aisha Hassan, Marcia Hutchinson, Salma Ibrahim and Tuyen Do hosted by award winning journalist and author Saima Mir.
Aisha Hassan is an award-winning writer living and working in London. A graduate of the University of Oxford’s prestigious Creative Writing Master’s programme and a Curtis Brown Creative alumna, Aisha’s play Pickled Mangoes was performed at Soho Theatre, and her poetry has appeared in Under the Radar and Campus magazines. When the Fireflies Dance is her debut novel and has been longlisted for the Bridport Novel Award and Hachette’s Mo Siewcharran Prize, and shortlisted for the London Writers Award.
Marcia Hutchinson was born in Manningham, Bradford, the seventh of nine children to Windrush generation Jamaican parents. The first pupil from her school to go to Oxford, Marcia worked as a lawyer before returning to the North and founding the educational publishing company Primary Colours. She was awarded an MBE in 2011 for her services to Cultural Diversity. Now a full-time writer and member of the Black Writers’ Guild,
Salma Ibrahim is a novelist, short-story writer and marketing manager at UNICEF. Her novel Salutation Road, while still in development, won the London Writers Award in 2019 and was a runner-up in the Future Worlds Prize in 2021. She lives in Greenwich, London, and has also spent a lot of time in the Middle East and East Africa.
Tuyen Do is an actor and writer. She was part of the Royal Court's 2012 studio group and is a founding member of Papergang Theatre, a company dedicated to nurturing new East Asian writers. Her short film Healthy screened internationally and won a honourable mention for Best Short, and Best Supporting Actor at the Asians on Film Festival in LA 2014. Her directing debut, short film Above the Waist earned her a Best Director nomination.
Saima Mir is an award-winning journalist and writer. Her debut novel, The Khan, was Times Bestseller and Times and Sunday Times Book of The Year. Described as 'genre-busting,' The Khan was shortlisted for The Crimefest Specsavers Debut Crime Novel Award, and Longlisted for the Jhalak and Portico Prize.
