The Watermelon Boys

Ruqaya Izzidien is an Iraqi-Welsh novelist and freelance journalist born to an Iraqi father and English mother, who grew up in Llanybydder, Wales, and studied Modern Languages at Durham University around 2005. Her debut novel, The Watermelon Boys (2018), a work of historical fiction set during World War I in Iraq, won a Betty Trask Award in 2019; her journalism has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Al Jazeera, and the BBC. She has reported from Gaza, Egypt, and Morocco, and now resides in northwest England.