Marlon James is a Jamaican novelist and essayist. He is best known for his award-winning novel A Brief History of Seven Killings, which won the 2015 Man Booker Prize. He is also the author of the novels The Book of Night Women, Black Leopard, Red Wolf, and The Confessions of Frannie Langton. James was born in Kingston, Jamaica in 1970. He studied at the University of the West Indies and the University of Minnesota, where he earned a master's degree in creative writing. He has taught creative writing at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, and at the University of Minnesota. James is a prolific writer, and his works often explore themes of identity, race, and colonialism. His writing style is characterized by its vivid imagery and lyrical prose. He has been praised for his ability to create complex characters and for his exploration of difficult topics. James has received numerous awards and honors for his work, including the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, and the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature. He is also a recipient of the Guggenheim Fellowship and the American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in Literature.