Adib Khorram

Khorram was born and raised in Kansas City, Missouri. In high school, he was an avid participant in school theater productions, and he also took several afterschool writing classes. At Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville, Khorram studied design and technical theater; he then worked for several years in event production. Darius the Great is Not Okay, published in 2018, was Khorram’s first novel, and it was published to great acclaim—it’s been awarded YALSA’s William C. Morris Award for Best Debut Author Writing for Teens and was listed as one of the best teen books of 2018 by Buzzfeed, the New York Public Library, Time, and BookBub. Khorram continued Darius’s story in Darius the Great Deserves Better, and he’s also written several other novels for young adults. Several aspects from Darius are based on Khorram’s personal experiences: he was raised Bahá’í, like Sohrab in the novel (though Khorram identifies as an atheist), his family is Iranian, and though it’s not made explicit until Darius the Great Deserves Better, Darius is, like Khorram, queer.