Alev Scott was born in 1987 to a Turkish mother and a British father. She studied Classics at New College, Oxford, where she was taught by Robin Lane Fox. After graduating, she worked in London as an assistant director in theater and opera before moving to Istanbul in 2011. Alev taught herself Turkish and immersed herself in the Turkish side of her heritage and wrote the widely acclaimed Turkish Awakening: Behind the Scenes of Modern Turkey, which was published by Faber in 2014. The book was brilliantly reviewed by Norman Stone, Owen Matthews, and Elif Shafak among others. She has since reported from Turkey for a wide number of newspapers, most specifically for the Financial Times.