Maria Dahvana Headley

Maria Dahvana Headley is an American author born in 1977 in Estacada, Oregon, working across fantasy, science fiction, and literary adaptation. Her early novels include Queen of Kings (2011), an alternate history reimagining Cleopatra, and the young-adult space-fantasy Magonia (2015), a New York Times bestseller, followed by its sequel Aerie (2016). She turned to literary reworking with The Mere Wife (2018), a contemporary retelling of Beowulf, and with Beowulf: A New Translation (2020), an acclaimed modern-vernacular translation that won the 2021 Hugo Award for Best Related Work and the Harold Morton Landon Translation Award. Headley, who identifies as queer, has also worked as an editor, poet, and playwright alongside her novels.