Abeer Hoque is a Nigerian born Bangladeshi American writer and photographer. Her novel in stories “The Lovers and the Leavers” was published by Bengal Lights Books (2014) and is forthcoming from HarperCollins India (2015). She has also published a coffee table book of travel photographs and poems called “The Long Way Home” (Ogro Bangladesh, 2013). She is the recipient of a 2014 NYFA grant, a 2012 NEA Literature Fellowship, a 2007 Fulbright Scholarship, and the 2005 Tanenbaum Award, and has received writing fellowships to attend Sacatar, Saltonstall Arts Colony, SLS St. Petersburg, the Virginia Center for Creative Arts, the Millay Colony, and the Albee Foundation. Her writing and photography has been published in Guernica, ZYZZYVA, Outlook Traveller, 580 Split, Drunken Boat, India Today, the Daily Star, the Commonwealth Short Story Competition, and KQED Writers Block, among others. She has BS and MA degrees from University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business, an MFA in writing (concentrations in