Sayantani DasGupta (she/her)
“Author Visits are like alchemy. I come in with a planned presentation, but then the students come in with their own joy, energy, curiosities and questions that switch on a dime from hilarious to deeply profound, and that’s where the magic happens!”
Biography
Sayantani DasGupta’s three careers – pediatrician, narrative medicine professor and New York Times-bestselling writer for young people — are all united by a love of story, and a belief that stories are good medicine. When Sayantani was in practice as a pediatrician, often writing “prescriptions for reading,” she cared for young people’s bodily and emotional health. As an academic, writing and teaching about narrative, health and social justice, she cares for her student’s intellectual health. As an author for young people, her purview is now readers’ imaginative health – because she firmly believes that books are imaginative playgrounds, allowing readers the time and space to dream future, more just worlds into being.
No matter what genre she is writing, Sayantani enjoys crafting stories that are equal parts humor and heart, placing social critique alongside silliness, weaving big ethical questions into fast paced adventure. She’s the author three interrelated middle grade fantasy series including the critically acclaimed, Bengali folktale and string theory-inspired Kiranmala and the Kingdom Beyond books, the first of which—The Serpent’s Secret—was a Bank Street Best Book of the Year, a Booklist Best Middle Grade Novel of the 21st Century, and an EB White Read Aloud Honor Book. She is also the author of two other series set in the Kingdom Beyond multiverse, the anticolonial Fire Queen series and the environmentally themed Secrets of the Sky series.
As a sucker for witty dialogue, smart heroines and swoony romance, Sayantani is lifelong Jane Austen fan. She is the author of two Austen inspired contemporary YA novels, Debating Darcy (Pride and Prejudice in a modern high school speech and debate setting) and Rosewood: A Midsummer Meet Cute (Sense and Sensibility + Midsummer Night’s Dream + PG-13 Bridgerton).
Her most recent book is the instant New York Times bestselling middle grade adventure Theft of the Ruby Lotus which is part love letter to New York City’s immigrant kids and families, and part twisty-turny art museum heist that asks questions about who gets to be the steward of whose precious cultural treasures.
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