Jessie Burton studied at Oxford University and The Central School of Speech and Drama. Rights to The Miniaturist, her first novel, sold in thirty-eight territories around the world, the bulk of which were sold at auction. Picador published it in the UK in summer 2014, and it entered the Sunday Times bestseller list in its first week of sales. It was named Waterstones Book of the Year 2014, and to date has sold over one million copies worldwide. It was BBC One’s flagship Christmas series of 2017, starring Romola Garai and Anya Taylor-Joy, and it aired in the United States on PBS Masterpiece in the fall of 2018.

Her second novel, The Muse, was published in summer 2016 and spent 10 weeks straight on the Sunday Times bestseller list, peaking at number one.

As a non-fiction writer, she has written essays and reviews for The New York Times, Harpers Bazaar UK, The Wall Street Journal, The Independent, Vogue, Elle, Red, Grazia, Lonely Planet Traveller and The Spectator. Harpers Bazaar US and Stylist have also published her short stories. She regularly appears on Radio 4 as a contributor to cultural programmes.

Found In Translation, her personal essay on Brexit, appeared in Goodbye Europe, published in 2017.

Jessie's first illustrated book for children, The Restless Girls, was published by Bloomsbury in September 2018, with Medusa to follow in 2020. She is working on her third novel for Picador, to be published in 2019.

Jessie Burton is represented by Juliet Mushens at Caskie Mushens Ltd.