Team
Lucy Hannah
Director
Lucy is founder and director of Untold Narratives. A social entrepreneur, editor and author, she has worked with writers in the UK and worldwide to develop and promote their work. Other initiatives Lucy has established include Commonwealth Writers, Out of the Gate and BBC Writers. She is a Visiting Research Fellow at King’s College, London and a director of the Bocas LitFest in Trinidad. She was co-editor of My Dear Kabul (Hodder/Coronet, 2024).
Steffanie Hartley
Accountant
Steffanie Hartley has been a qualified accountant since 2001 with the Institute of Chartered Accountants for England and Wales. She trained and worked in auditing for Deloitte between 1997 and 2001 and then worked for a FTSE 100 company between 2001 and 2006. After a career break, she set up as sole practitioner in 2012 and increasingly specialises in not for profits.
Frankie Jenner
Communications Manager
Frankie is communications manager at Untold Narratives. Having worked across arts, film and cultural organisations in the Arab world, Asia and Europe, her experience spans communications, editorial and content creation with a focus on stories produced in translation beyond the Anglosphere. Alongside her role at Untold Narratives, she works at Translator Magazine, Here and Elsewhere Film Festival and is a freelance researcher and writer.
Mark Osman-Barter
Finance and Operations Coordinator
Mark has worked across creative and community-focused organisations supporting projects that bring people together. They co-own Corner New Cross, an LGBTQ+ coffee shop and arts venue with a vibrant programme of events, and previously managed operations at Feix & Merlin Architects, contributing to the studio’s creative and cultural work. Their experience reflects a commitment to inclusion, collaboration, and the sustainable growth of creative communities.
Patrick Spaven
Monitoring and Evaluation
Patrick is an independent consultant and practitioner in monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL) and Theory of Change (ToC), and Visiting Fellow at Manchester University. He works mainly in international development and in building MEL systems in governments, organisations, grant funds and programmes.
Anam Zafar
Editorial and Partnerships Manager
Anam brings her experience as an award-winning literary translator, editor and creative workshop facilitator, with a focus on platforming marginalised voices. As a translator from Arabic and French into English, prizes awarded include a PEN Presents x International Booker Prize, and publications include with Penguin Random House and The Paris Review. She appears on the 100 Inspiring Muslims: Next Generation Edition list (Emerald Network/Aziz Foundation).
Paranda
Marina Mohammadi
Project Co-ordinator
Marina is project co-ordinator of Paranda, and has been a member of the writers group since 2020. She has an MA in Communication Management and has worked in communications for CARE Afghanistan, project officer for GIZ and a social and admin officer for CGO. She has had short stories published in My Pen Is the Wing of a Bird: New Fiction by Afghan Women (MacLehose, 2022), Moveable Type and WritersMosaic, and is a contributing writer to My Dear Kabul (Coronet/Hodder, 2024). Marina works in Dari, Urdu, German, and English.
Editors
Sunila Galappatti
Editor
Sunila has worked with other people’s stories as a dramaturg, theatre director, editor and writer: at the Royal Shakespeare Company, Live Theatre (Newcastle), Galle Literary Festival, Raking Leaves, Suriya Women’s Development Centre, Commonwealth Writers, and Himal Southasian. She worked with a long-term prisoner of war in the Sri Lankan conflict, to retell his story in A Long Watch (Hurst, 2016). Sunila has worked as an editor on various Untold projects since 2020. including, My Pen Is the Wing of a Bird: New Fiction by Afghan Women (MacLehose Press, 2022) and she was co-editor of My Dear Kabul (Hodder/Coronet, 2024).
Zarghuna Kargar
Editor
Zarghuna is an award-winning BBC journalist and author of, Dear Zari, The Secret Lives of Women in Afghanistan (Sourcebooks, 2012). Zarghuna was an editor and translator for My Pen Is the Wing of a Bird: New Fiction by Afghan Women (MacLehose Press, 2022) and Rising After the Fall (Scholastic, 2023). She works across Pashto, Dari, and English, to support Paranda writers to develop their work.
Taran N. Khan
Editor
Taran is an award-winning journalist and nonfiction writer. Her first book, Shadow City: A Woman Walks Kabul (Vintage, 2021) won the Tata Literature Live! First Book award and the Stanford Dolman Travel Book of the Year award. As a journalist and essayist her writing has appeared in Al Jazeera, Granta, the Guardian, Himal Southasian and Guernica, among others. Taran focuses on life-writing and non-fiction, with Paranda. She is the guest editor of an Afghan edition of Shuddhashar, featuring a selection of writing from Paranda.
Qais Akbar Omar
Editor
Qais is the author of A Fort of Nine Towers Pan Macmillan, 2014) and co-author of A Night in the Emperor’s Garden, (Haus Publishers, 2015),dramatized by BBC Radio. He has written for The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Boston Globe, among others, and his short stories have featured in The Southern Review, AGNI, The Markaz Review, and elsewhere. Qais has a MFA in Creative Writing from Boston University, and he was a Scholars at Risk Fellow at Harvard University. Qais has been an editor for Paranda since 2024.
Azadeh Parsapour
Editor
Azadeh is the managing director of Nogaam Publishing, supporting and empowering Iranian authors and translators. It advocates freedom of speech, promotes Persian-language digital publishing and provides access to books for Farsi readers. Azadeh is also the founder of Tehran Book Fair Uncensored. She works with writers in Dari and Farsi to develop short and long-form fiction and non-fiction. Nogaam is publishing a collection of stories written by Paranda writers in Dari.
Lillie Razvi Toon
Editor
Lillie is former Project Manager of Paranda, Co-Editor of My Dear Kabul (Hodder/Coronet, 2024), and was an Assistant Editor on Untold’s Write Afghanistan project. She now works with Paranda writers as an Editor, co-editing a special Afghan women’s issue of Wasafiri magazine, alongside her role as Prizes Manager at the Booker Prize Foundation, managing the International Booker Prize. Lillie has previously worked as an Editorial Assistant at Linden Editions and as an Events Manager and Assistant Producer at Wimbledon BookFest.
Katherine Skala
Editor
Katri has worked as a writer, editor, mentor and senior arts administrator. She has mentored writers of fiction and non-fiction for the National Centre for Writing, and she edited the literary journal Pretext at UEA. She’s the author of A Perfect Mother (Hikari Press, 2018) and is completing a new novel, The First of All Pleasures. Katri has been an editor for Paranda writers since 2023, developing short stories, non-fiction and life-writing.
We also work with literary editors Sharmilla Beezmohun, Marina Benjamin and Gabriel Gbadamosi.
Translators
Shabnam Fayyaz
Translator
Shabnam is based in New York. She is an Operations Coordinator at the International Rescue Committee. Born in Afghanistan, Shabnam has a B.A. in Peace and Global Studies, from Earlham College, Indiana, and an M.A. in Human Rights Studies from Columbia University. She has translated fiction from Dari to English, for Paranda since 2024.
Parwana Fayyaz
Translator
Born in Afghanistan, Parwana was raised in Pakistan. She a research fellowship as the Carmen Blacker Fellow at Peterhouse, Cambridge University and is now an assistant professor at the University of Virgina’s Department of Middle Eastern & South Asian Languages & Cultures. Parwana has worked with Paranda writers since 2020, translating from Dari to English, for My Pen Is the Wing of a Bird: New Fiction by Afghan Women (MacLehose Press, 2022) and she was co-translator and co-editor of My Dear Kabul (Hodder/Coronet, 2024).
Dr Negeen Kargar
Translator
Negeen is a translator, writer, and research scientist. She has translated and interpreted for the Guardian, Channel 4 and BBC Radio, and is an associate member of the Royal Society of Chemistry. She has worked with Paranda writers since 2020, including My Pen Is the Wing of a Bird: New Fiction by Afghan Women (MacLehose Press, 2022) and she was co-translator of My Dear Kabul (Hodder/Coronet, 2024).
Abdul Bacet Khurram
Translator
Abdul is an interpreter and literary translator working in Dari, Pashto, and English. He has been working as a translator and interpreter with Untold Narratives since 2024.
Natasha Alam Mahsud
Translator
Natasha is a Pashto translator from Pakistan. She is studying at University College London, doing a PhD exploring Pashtun tribal norms, culture and identity. Natasha has worked with Paranda since 2024, translating fiction from Pashto to English.
Dr Zubair Popalzai
Translator
Zubair is a Pashto, Dari and English language translation and interpreter. He is a legal interpreter, and a consultant translator for BBC Monitoring. He’s also worked as an interpreter for United Nations special envoys in South Asia. Zubair has worked with Paranda writers since 2020, translating stories from Dari to English and was one of the translators on My Pen Is the Wing of a Bird: New Fiction by Afghan Women (MacLehose Press, 2022).
Homa Salehyar
Translator
Homa has worked as a research assistant with Afghanistan’s Independent Human Rights Commission and the Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit. Since migrating to the UK after 2021, Homa has been translating for The Big Word and Untold. She has worked with Paranda since 2024, translating fiction from Dari to English.
Write Assamese
Esha Chatterjee
Project Partner
Esha is the CEO of BEE Books in Kolkata, publishing everything from translations, fiction, non-fiction, essays, to graphic novels and photobooks. She is also the managing director and marketing lead of Patra Bharati, the third largest Bengali publishing house. Esha is also a book reviewer, critic and event moderator. BEE Books was Untold’s project partner for its Write Assamese project, 2022-2023.
Riddhi Maitra
Project Partner
Riddhi is the managing editor of BEE Books in Kolkata, where she works on a variety of manuscripts across fiction, non-fiction, and photobooks. In 2022, Riddhi was selected as a fellow for the British Council’s International Publishing Fellowship.
Mitra Phukan
Editor
Mitra is a writer, translator, editor, and classical vocalist. Her novels include The Collector’s Wife (2005), A Monsoon of Music (2011) and What Will People Say (2023). She is the editor of the short story collection A Full Night’s Thievery (2016). Mitra also writes children’s books and has a regular column in The Assamese Tribune. He was co-editor of Untold’s Write Assamese project, which resulted in A Fistful of Moonlight: New Fiction from Assam (MacLehose Press, 2023).
Arunava Sinha
Mentor Translator
Arunava is a professor of creative writing at Ashoka University and co-director of the Ashoka Centre of Translation. He is an award-winning translator of classic, modern and contemporary Bengali fiction, and nonfiction into English and vice versa. He was the mentor translator and co-editor of Untold’s Write Assamese project, which resulted in A Fistful of Moonlight: New Fiction from Assam (MacLehose Press, 2023).