Tahereh Mafi

Mafi was born on November 9, 1988, in a small town in Connecticut. She is the youngest child of her family and has four older brothers. Mafi's parents are immigrants from Iran. At age 12 she moved with her family to Northern California and at age 14 they moved to Orange County. Mafi graduated from University High School in Irvine, California. She later graduated from the Soka University of America in Aliso Viejo, California. She has varying levels of competency in eight different languages. She studied abroad in Barcelona, Spain for a semester in college. During this trip she had the opportunity to be fully immersed in the Spanish language.