Abbas Khider was born 1973 in Baghdad and has been living in Germany since 2000. In 1996 he was released from prison, where he was held due to »political reasons«. From 1996 to 2000 he had to survive as a refugee in many countries. He studies philosophy and literature in Germany. He published various poems in Arabic language. He lives in Berlin, Germany.

Der falsche Inder was his debut novel, in Spring 2011 his new novel Die Orangen des Präsidenten was published. He won the »Adelbert von Chamisso Förderpreis«, a renowned sponsorship award, in 2010. The voices and fates in this debut novel tell a realistic fairy tale. Abbas Khider combines the tragic with a laugh, the grotesque with ordinary life. This novel is the story of his life and impresses by its unadorned point of view and his en-passant-way of narrating the misery.

During his stay at Villa Aurora he will be working on his next novel, which is centered around life in Iraq during the time of the American Invasion in 2003 and narrates the story of a friendship between a mentally retarded Iraqi boy and an American soldier with Iraqi family background.