Storyteller.
Novelist.
Pakistani-American.
Writing fiction at the intersection of identity, power, and the unapologetic act of taking up space.
Currently Querying
Nineteen-year-old Amara Khan has three strikes against her: she’s Pakistani-American, Muslim, and she has uncontrollable visions that hijack her mind and show her violent events as they happen. When she anonymously stops a terrorist attack at Rockefeller Center in 2004, she’s arrested as an enemy combatant instead of celebrated as a hero — and disappears into a legal black hole.
The truth of why she’s been taken soon becomes clear. The CIA wants to recruit her into a secret program for people with supernatural abilities like hers. Agree, and she’s released into their custody. Refuse, and she vanishes into a black-site prison forever. Trained at a secret desert facility and sent on a covert mission from New York to Damascus to Beirut, Amara must decide whether change comes from resisting power — or serving it from within.
For readers of Legendborn by Tracy Deonn and The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami.
Status badge: Currently querying
I’ve always been a storyteller
I grew up in New York City writing short stories as a creative outlet, a thread that ran quietly through everything: Political Science at the University of Michigan (Go Blue!), learning Arabic in Cairo, practicing law as a divorce attorney in London, building a career in brand consulting and tech. The worlds I moved through kept shaping the stories I wanted to tell.
What brought me to writing fiction seriously was a growing conviction that Muslim writers and writers of color have untold stories that can shape how people view the world, make them ask questions, sit with discomfort, and celebrate what makes us all unique. I am proud to be part of that conversation.
In 2025 I was awarded the Highlights Foundation Muslim Storytellers Whole Novel Fellowship, and I now mentor emerging writers through that same program. I am currently querying LEGACY, my first novel.
For queries, press, speaking, or just to say hello
Email: mariamfmuzaffarwrites@gmail.com