Author Bio
• Birth—1947
• Where—Louisville, Alabama, USA
• Education—N/A
• Currently—lives in Atlanta, Georgia
Jean P. Sasson is an American writer who writes mainly about women in the Middle East.
In 1978 she traveled to Saudi Arabia to work in the King Faisal Specialist Hospital in Riyadh as an administrative coordinator in Medical Affairs. She worked at the hospital for 4 years, then married, living in Saudi Arabia until 1990. She is currently based in Atlanta, Georgia.
Her first book, The Rape of Kuwait about the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, was published in 1991. It was based on interviews she conducted with Kuwaitis who had fled to Cairo, Saudi Arabia, London and Washington, D.C. The book was published before the war broke out. Advertisements in the major newspapers and on network television featured the book with the accompanying tag line: "Read it and you'll know why we're there." The Kuwaiti Embassy in Washington paid to send 200,000 copies of it to American troops in the Persian Gulf.
Sasson's second book Princess: A True Story of Life Behind the Veil in Saudi Arabia chronicles the life of Sultana, a purported Saudi princess. It claims to be a true story, detailing gender inequalities experienced by Saudi Arabian women. The identity of Sultana (a pseudonym) is concealed to assure her safety. The book remained on the New York Times Best Seller list for 13 weeks. In 1995, a lawsuit was brought against the author of the book alleging plagiarism. The lawsuit was later dismissed. (From Wikipedia.)