Mona Simpson

Mona Simpson was born as Mona Jandali on June 14, 1957 in Green Bay, Wisconsin, USA, to parents Abdulfattah Jandali and Joanne Schieble Simpson. Her mother had given birth to a boy before getting married to her father. This boy, who had been placed for adoption, later grew up to be Apple Inc. CEO and co-founder, Steve Jobs. Talking about Simpson’s education, she studied at Beverly Hills High School and then attended University of California and Columbia University. In 1993, she married TV writer and producer Richard Appel. The couple had two kids, Gabriel and Grace, before getting divorced.

Mona Simpson served as an editor for the ‘Paris Review’ when she was a student at Columbia University. Her first novel was ‘Anywhere but Here’, released in 1986. This Whiting Award winning novel was a huge success and was even adapted as a movie later on. The sequel of the novel, titled ‘The Lost Father,’ came out in 1992. After this, Simpson published her third novel ‘A Regular Guy’. This novel depicted the strained relationship between a father and his daughter who is born out of wedlock. Then in 2000, the author’s fourth novel titled ‘Off Keck Road’ got published. It told the story of three ladies in the Midwest.

In 2001, she started teaching creative writing at the University of California, Los Angeles. She was also appointed as a professor at the Bard College around this time. A few years later, Simpson authored the novel ‘My Hollywood’ that was published in 2010. This novel explored the perspectives of two women, Lola and Claire, and the complex relationship issues faced by them. After this, she released her novel titled ‘Casebook’ in 2014. The talented writer has also written short stores including ‘Victory Mills’, ‘Ramadan’, ‘The Driving Child’ and ‘Holiday,’ as well as an essay titled ‘A Sister’s Eulogy for Steve Jobs’.