Éliette Abécassis (born January 27, 1969) is a French writer of Moroccan-Jewish descent. She is a professor of philosophy at the University of Caen Normandy. Abécassis was born in Strasbourg. She grew up in a bourgeois sephardic jewish family. Her father is a theologian and her mother a child psychiatrist. She attended Lycée Henri-IV and École Normale Supérieure, and then went to Harvard University. Her first book, Qumran , was released in 1996 after three years of research, and has been translated into eighteen languages. Her second title, L'Or et la cendre , details the historical and mysterious murder of a Berlin theologian. Murder also features strongly in her 1998 work on the philosophical origins of homicide entitled Petite Métaphysique du meurtre. Her next novel, La Répudiée , a finalist for the Grand Prix du roman de l'Académie française and for the Prix Fémina, was the inspiration for Israeli-American film director Amos Gitai's film Kadosh (Sacred) which was selected for Cannes Film Festival. It was also published in English by Aurora Metro Books under the title Sacred. To research this book, Abécassis spent six months in the very orthodox Mea Shearim section of Jerusalem. Her book Clandestin (2003) was one of twelve books chosen for the Prix Goncourt. In 2012, she performed a musical version of Sepharade , after her eponymous book, with French baritone David Serero in Paris. A movie was also made inspired by her book Un heureux événement .