Kapka Kassabova is a poet, essayist and travel writer who was born in Sofia, Bulgaria. After leaving Bulgaria as a teenager and living in England and New Zealand, she now resides in Edinburgh, Scotland.

The Australian journalist Clive James has said of her: "In the suitcase that she has mentally lived out of since she was a little girl, Kapka Kassabova has brought the turbulent memories of 20th century European history with her to New Zealand, where she recollects bad dreams in comparative tranquillity, and always with the phrasing of a born musician."