Rima Bali Follow

Rima Bali is an acclaimed Syrian writer, born in Aleppo in 1969. She studied at Aleppo University and managed an historic hotel in old Aleppo until the outbreak of the war in the city. She left Syria in 2015 and now resides in Madrid, Spain. Her published works include four novels: Milagro, meaning “miracle” in Spanish (2016), The Blue Sunflower (2018), Suleima’s Ring (2022); and Flute in a Western Orchestra (2023). Suleima’s Ring, her first novel to be translated into English, was shortlisted for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction.

Timothy Gregory is an Arabic to English translator from Seattle, Washington. For more than twenty-five years, he has worked as a translator in both the public and the private sectors. His passion as a reader of novels of all kinds led him to pursue the shift to translating literature, leading to an MA in translation from the University of Illinois in 2018. His first three translated books are the Warriors and Warlocks trilogy by Dr. Monther Alkabbani.