Alain Mabanckou was born in 1966 in Congo and currently lives in Los Angeles, where he teaches literature at UCLA. His six previous novels Black Moses, African Psycho, Memoirs of a Porcupine, Broken Glass, Black Bazaar and Tomorrow I'll Be Twenty are all published by Serpent's Tail. Among his many honours are the Académie Française's Grand Prix de literature and the 2016 French Voices Award for The Lights of Pointe-Noire. Mabanckou is a Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur, was a finalist for the 2015 Man Booker International Prize and has featured on Vanity Fair's list of France's fifty most influential people.