by Nikita Singh
She ran her fingers through his hair. ‘We’ll be okay.’
And then, they sat there for a long time, Sameer coming up with all sorts of scenarios from their future together—their kids, their first car, their own house and the places they wanted to visit. They chose what they would wear, and where she would shop from. And as they painted a beautiful picture of their future, Anjali swore to herself that she would not give up till she left her past behind. With Sameer by her side, she knew she could.
Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan is the author of You Are Here and Cold Feet, both bestselling novels. She also wrote the young adult novel The Life & Times of Layla The Ordinary under the name Minna Madhavan for younger readers.
Meenakshi has been writing from the time she was a young girl, and began her now famous blog Compulsive Confessions at twentytwo. The blog is ten years old, and gets approximately 40,000 hits per month—a massive first for a personal blog in India.
Meenakshi was featured as one of the women of the year in a leading national daily and she was also one of Airtel’s featured youth in a campaign they did for ThinkFest.
She also works as a lifestyle journalist and freelancer and has been with three major publications in the past. At the moment, Meenakshi is working on her next book, juggling multiple deadlines, and working to feed her fat ginger cat: TC. She lives in New Delhi and Mumbai with her partner.
Durjoy Datta was born in New Delhi and completed a degree in engineering and business management before embarking on a writing career. His first book—Of Course I Love You!—was published when he was twenty-one years old and was an instant bestseller. His successive novels—Now That You’re Rich!, She Broke Up, I Didn’t!, Ohh Yes, I Am Single!, If It’s Not Forever, Till the Last Breath, Someone Like You and Hold My Hand—have made him one of the highest selling authors in India.
In 2009, he was recognised as a young achiever by The Times of India. He was chosen as one of the two young achievers in the field of media and communications by Whistling Woods International in 2011 and was one of the recipients of the Teacher’s Achievement Awards in 2012.
Durjoy is currently based at Mumbai, where he writes a hugely popular sitcom Saada Haq for Channel V. He loves dogs and is an active Crossfitter. You can follow him on Twitter (@durjoydatta) or Facebook (www.facebook.com/durjoydatta1).
Judy Balan writes romantic-comedy. More comedy than romance, she insists. It’s more like a deconstruction of the romantic-comedy, really. So while her stories are sometimes part romantic, she gets her kick out of taking digs at romance as a genre. This is why both her novels have a distinct anti-romance thing going for them and not because she’s turned into ‘Bitter Divorced Lady’ who likes to burst everyone’s happily-ever-after bubbles.
She’s also a compulsive theorist. You may hop over to her blog www.womanandaquarter.blogspot.com to find all her theories, ranging from the profound to the delightfully superficial.
Judy is the author of the bestselling Two Fates: The Story of My Divorce and Sophie Says: Memoirs of a Breakup Coach. She’s currently working on her third novel (a comedy about death) and her first sitcom. She also writes plays, columns, blogs and enjoys testing her skills across mediums and talking about herself in the third person. Judy and her daughter Kiara, live in Chennai.
Harsh Snehanshu is twenty-four but looks older. He studied at IIT where he barely passed and went on to start-up a venture at which he most definitely failed. He then devoted a year and a half to travel across the country on a shoestring budget, sleeping wherever there was space and eating whatever was available. He has a wealth of stories to tell which can be accounted for by the wealth of grey hair he has. He loves to paint, sing and play any musical instrument that he chances upon. He enjoys telling stories, real or mostly otherwise, to those interested at TEDx and college festivals.
The author of Because Shit Happened: What Not To Do In A Start-up! and the bestselling Kanav-Tanya trilogy, Harsh currently is back to school as a Young India Fellow. You can read his columns in The Hindu and Tehelka.
Shoma Narayanan started reading romances at the age of eleven, borrowing them from neighbours, and hiding them inside textbooks so that her parents didn’t find out. At that time, the thought of writing one herself never entered her head—she was convinced she wanted to be a teacher when she grew up. Like most childhood dreams, that one didn’t come true (sigh), and she ended up becoming a banker instead.
Three years ago, Shoma took up writing as a hobby (after successively trying her hand at baking, sewing, knitting, crochet and patchwork), and was amazed at how much she enjoyed it. To her own surprise, she ended up being Mills & Boon’s first Indian author to be published internationally. She’s had four novels published so far, and has three more releasing in 2014. Her family has been unfailingly supportive of her latest hobby, and are also secretly very, very relieved that they don’t have to eat, wear or display the results!
Parinda Joshi is a technology enthusiast by day, a writer by night, and a caffeine-based life form in between. Born and raised in Ahmedabad, she’s often found making small talk on a flight between the entertainment capital of the world, Los Angeles, and the geek hub, Silicon Valley, trying to juggle her interests and family.
Parinda is the author of two novels that couldn’t be more different from each other; Live from London and Powerplay. She has contributed to publications like The South Asian Times and GQ on a variety of topics—music, technology and trends that affect South Asians globally.
She indulges in reading, photography, people-watching and biking with her husband when she’s not busy being outwitted by her five-year-old daughter.
She tweets at @randomwalkers and there isn’t a Gujju joke in Twitterverse that she hasn’t heard. More about Parinda at her website (www.parindajoshi.com).
Atulya Mahajan is the proud father of two—an adorable young boy who has him mostly wrapped around his little finger, and a funny book called Amreekandesi: Masters of America, which came to life in 2013.
Atulya has been writing a popular satire blog at amreekandesi.com for many years now, and his greatest fear is someone important actually reading his blog-posts and shutting down the blog. His second greatest fear is driving. He has spent thousands of hours shouting at random taxi drivers and motorcyclists who overtake from the wrong side, more so when he is trying to tweet something profound while also keeping an eye on the road. Atulya’s Twitter addiction has got him into a lot of trouble over the last few years, mostly from his mother and wife, who threaten to forfeit his phone any day now.
Atulya would write more often if only he didn’t have to deal with the millions of fans who stalk him wherever he goes, in his dreams.
Nikita Singh was born in Patna and brought up in Indore, and was pursuing a bachelor’s degree in pharmacy when she turned to writing. Her first book—Love @ Facebook—came out in May 2011, when she was nineteen years old, and since then, she has written many more novels—Accidentally In Love, If It’s Not Forever, The Promise, Someone Like You, Right Here Right Now. She loves collaboration, and has written two novels with Durjoy Datta, a non-fiction title with Myshkin Ingawale (The Unreasonable Fellows) and edited an anthology of short stories (25 Strokes of Kindness) with Orvana Ghai. She has also contributed to the books of The Backbenchers series, The Extra Class and The Missed Call, co-authoring them with Durjoy, under a pen name.
With a library stocked with over 12,000 books, she is a voracious reader. A cricket enthusiast and a fitness freak, Nikita is based at New Delhi, where she works at a leading publishing house. Touch base with her on Twitter or Instagram (@singh_nikita) or Facebook (www.facebook.com/nikitasingh.page).
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