Lale Gül

About Lale Gül

Lale Gül is studying Dutch at the VU when she debuts at the age of twenty-three with the bestseller Ik ga leven. Until she was seventeen, she attended a Quran school of Stichting Milli Görüs on weekends. In her autobiographical debut novel ‘Ik ga leven‘, she challenges everything she learned there and more.

More than 250,000 copies of her book have been sold, the film rights have been sold, and the book has been translated into multiple languages. In November 2021, Lale won the NS Publieksprijs with Ik ga leven as the youngest winner ever.

In 2022, she created a successful podcast series about apostates. In this podcast Van God Los, Lale and journalist Ronit Palache engage in conversations with people who feel disconnected from God. A – often invisible – struggle behind Dutch doors. What is it like to go to bed as a child with the idea that God has already decided whether you will go to hell or heaven? How does it feel to be labeled an apostate by those you hold dear? In five episodes, apostates (sometimes anonymously) and experts share their stories.

Currently, Lale is frequently invited for lectures in libraries and as a speaker at conferences on social themes, but above all, she is busy living.

She is working on her second book and is a columnist for, among others, Het Parool and Wendy magazine.