A dedication

Dadima. The greatest storyteller of all time.

In a small home in the foothills of the Himalayas, as dusk gathers, a grandmother sits on a worn settee surrounded by her little grandchildren. As she feeds them bites of roti and veggies one by one from her plate, she draws them into worlds from ancient legends. Castles bustle with life and the forest hums in shifting winds. While an exiled prince hunts a deer to feed his wife, a demon approaches the Princess alone in their forest hut, and the wide-eyed children gasp. Their grandmother weaves tales of abducted princesses and cities burned to ashes, of warrior kings who vanquished ten-headed demons, of valor and sacrifice, love and loss, of right and wrong, and the ultimate victory of good over evil. Drawn from ancient Indian epics, she unties the thread that strings generations together and teaches her young of the moral fabric that sustains humanity.

***

She had dreamed of writing a book but life didn’t allow it. 

Every word I write is from her.

About me

When first I landed in the United States to begin my Internship in Medicine, I hadn’t known that in the the zigzag course of life, my lifeline would be the steady stream of stories conjured by my mind. Over the years and across the country, I’ve met people at their most vulnerable, and often left in awe of their strength and resilience. I’ve realized that no matter our differences, we all laugh and cry at the same things, and we crave love, family, happiness. Every one of us has a story, and in our stories is our shared humanity. And while I write mysteries and thrillers with a dash of everything else thrown in, what informs my writing I learned a long time ago at my grandmother’s side: Victory over evil. The good guys gotta win.