M.G. Vassanji was born in Kenya, and raised in Tanzania. He studied physics at M.I.T. and the University of Pennsylvania, before going to Canada in 1978.
His first novel, The Gunny Sack (1989), won a regional Commonwealth Writers Prize and he was invited to be writer-in-residence at the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa, where he began researching The Book of Secrets. That
celebrated bestselling novel won the inaugural Giller Prize, in 1994.

Vassanji’s other books include the acclaimed novels No New Land (1991), Amriika (1999), The In-Between World of Vikram Lall (2003), which also won the Giller Prize, and The Assassin's Song (2007), which was short-listed for the Giller Prize, the Governor General's Prize, and India's Crossword Prize. He has also written two collections of short stories, Uhuru Street (1990), and When She Was Queen (2005). A Place Within: Rediscovering India (2008) is his travel memoir about his journeys in India. He has also written a short biography, Mordecai Richler (2009), about the late celebrated Canadian writer. His unique place in literature comes from his elegant style, his narrative reach, and his interest in characters grappling to reconcile the different worlds within themselves. The subtle relationship of the past and present are also constants in his writing: “When someone asks you where you are from or who you are, there is a whole résumé of who you are. I know very few people who do not have a past to explain. That awareness is part of my work.”