about	Tishani Doshi was born and lives in Madras, India. Being the product of two cultures (Gujarati and Welsh), and the middle of three children, and also being curious and sensitive by nature, it was almost always certain that she would become a writer. As a teenager she discovered her mother’s love letters to her father and resolved to one day write her own version of their story. At 18 she left India for the United States of America to study Business Administration at Queens College in Charlotte, North Carolina. During her undergraduate years she worked as a baby-sitter, house-cleaner, librarian and cashier in the student’s snack bar. She also developed a deep love for the literature of the South, and in her junior year decided to become a poet. This decision was followed up with a Masters in The Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Tishani moved to London in 1999 and landed her first and last fulltime job as the assistant to the advertising department at Harper’s & Queen magazine. The glamour of Gucci and Prada was exciting for a while, but then the reality of skinny cappuccinos and spreadsheets took over. After many months of 9-5, and commuting on the London underground, she experienced an epiphany. The epiphany arrived on a rainy day in November, and the gist of it was this: maybe it’s time to go home. In 2001 Tishani moved back to India with the idea of training to become a scuba diving instructor. Instead, a serendipitous encounter with one of India’s leading choreographers – Chandralekha, resulted in an unexpected change in direction. At 26, she began a career as a dancer. For the next five years she performed with Chandralekha’s troupe in India and abroad. She also worked as a freelance journalist, tinkered with poems and began working on a novel. During this time she developed a particular disorder: chronic wanderlust combined with the need to stay rooted. She became obsessed with travel – visiting such far-flung places as Antarctica, Bhutan, Mexico, Japan, Sri Lanka, and Ethiopia, and she documented things as diverse as monasteries and hot springs, cricket and transsexuals. In 2005, she was a finalist in the Outlook-Picador Non-Fiction competition for her essay, Excerpts from the Journal of a Delusional Widow. In 2006, she won the All-India Poetry competition for her poem, “The Day We Went to the Sea.” Tishani published her debut collection of poetry, Countries of the Body, to critical acclaim in 2006. The book won the prestigious Forward Prize for Best First Collection, and the judges called it “A work of a striking, emerging talent, who is prepared to take risks in pursuit of sensual, emotionally engaged and passionate poetry.” Other highlights from that year include an invitation to the Hay-on-Wye festival in Wales, where she shared a stage with two of her literary heroes – Margaret Atwood and Seamus Heaney, and where she had yet another serendipitous encounter, this time with the future publisher of her novel. The future publisher and Tishani were neighbours at the same B&B; they bonded over fried eggs and literature. Tishani’s first novel, The Pleasure Seekers, is published by Bloomsbury in the UK and USA, and Penguin India. It is currently being translated into German, Spanish, Italian, French, Serbian, Croatian and Polish.
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	“This is a captivating, delightful novel. I was totally engaged by Tishani Doshi’s people and by their world, and the language often rises – when speaking of the great matters, life, death, and above all love – to powerful metaphorical heights.” – Salman Rushdie.