Hafsah Faizal

1 universe Last reviewed 2026-08-24

Hafsah Faizal is an American author of young adult fantasy, born in 1993 in Florida and raised in California. She is an American Muslim of Sri Lankan and Arab descent, the eldest of four children of Muslim Sri Lankan immigrant parents, and was homeschooled from the age of thirteen. At seventeen she founded IceyDesigns, a web design company, and has run the book blog IceyBooks since 2010; she describes herself as 'a very visual writer,' a sensibility she credits to her design background. Her debut traditionally published novel, We Hunt the Flame (2019), follows a young woman who disguises herself as a man to journey into a dangerous forest and restore magic to her people; it became a New York Times bestseller, debuting at number five. She completed the duology with We Free the Stars (2021). Faizal returned to bestseller lists with A Tempest of Tea (2024) and its sequel A Steeping of Blood (2025), which reached number three on the New York Times bestseller list. Her novels are noted for drawing on Arabian and South Asian cultural influences within richly imagined fantasy worlds, and for blending striking visual worldbuilding with fast-paced, romance-inflected plotting that has made her one of the most commercially successful young adult fantasy authors of her generation.

Universe(s)

Books

• We Hunt the Flame (2019) · Sands of Arawiya Core Canon
• We Free the Stars (2021) · Sands of Arawiya Core Canon

Aggregate across all universes

• Total Core Canon books across all universes: 2 books
• Award recognitions across all universes: 0 (None recorded)

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