• Hi! I'm Naseem—queer, nonbinary, Persian, trans, Chicagoan, writer, neuroscientist, baker, nerd, gamer.

    An image of Naseem, laughing and bent over. They are a light-skinned West Asian person with brown hair and a headband, wearing jean shorts and a Captain America shield shirt.

    Pronouns:

    they/them/their/themself

    Pronunciation:

    NA-seem JAM-knee-ah

    Born to Iranian immigrants, I was raised in the North Side of Chicago. My writing has appeared in The Washington Post, Cosmopolitan, The Rumpus, The Writer's Chronicle, and other venues. I was the 2018 Bitch Media Fellow in Technology, a 2019 Lambda Literary Fellow in Young Adult Fiction, and a 2022 Otherwise Fellow, and was named the inaugural Samuel R. Delany Fellow. My debut novella, The Bruising of Qilwa, was released by Tachyon Publications in 2022 to critical praise and was a finalist for both the Crawford Award and Locus Award. My debut middle grade horror, Sleepaway, releases from Aladdin in 2025.

     

    My favorite personal essays that I've written are for The Rumpus. I'm also proud of what I produced for Bitch Media while they were still around.

  • More About Me

    For official bios, please check my press kit.

    I did my undergraduate at the University of Chicago and my master's at DePaul University. Until January 2017, I balanced my writing with my work as a neuroscientist, where I studied rodent models of both concussions and psychiatric disabilities. I left my PhD program at the University of Pennsylvania after the 2016 US presidential election to pursue my lifelong love of writing full time.

     

    I currently live in Reno, Nevada (unceded territory belonging to the Numu, Wašiw, Newe, and Nuwu peoples), where I graduated from the MFA program in fiction at the University of Nevada, Reno, and received a graduate certificate in Gender, Race, and Identity. I write speculative fiction, primarily (secondary world) fantasy, across all ages (adult and kidlit (MG/YA) both). I also write both creative and journalistic nonfiction; for the latter, I focus mainly on science and science literary, academia, social justice, and public health. I'm represented by Erica Bauman at Aevitas Creative Management at Aevitas Creative Management.

    Last but not least, I'm also an editor!

    See my hire me page for more information about my freelance services, which includes developmental and copyediting, authenticity/sensitivity reads, and speaking events.

    My favorite games are JRPGs, I love cooking and baking, and I am always hankering for my next tattoo.