Indu Sundaresan is an

Indian-American Indian Americans or Indo-Americans are citizens of the United States with ancestry from India. The United States Census Bureau uses the term Asian Indian to avoid confusion with Native Americans, who have also historically been referred t ...

author of historical fiction.

Personal life

She was born and raised in India as the daughter of an

Indian Air Force The Indian Air Force (IAF) is the air force, air arm of the Indian Armed Forces. Its complement of personnel and aircraft assets ranks third amongst the air forces of the world. Its primary mission is to secure Indian airspace and to conduct ...

pilot, Group Captain R. Sundaresan, who died in a crash while on duty. Her mother's name is Madhuram Sundaresan. The family then moved to

Bangalore Bangalore (), officially Bengaluru (), is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Karnataka. It has a population of more than and a metropolitan population of around , making it the third most populous city and fifth most ...

, where she collected books eagerly. She then migrated to the United States for graduate studies at the

University of Delaware The University of Delaware (colloquially UD or Delaware) is a public land-grant research university located in Newark, Delaware. UD is the largest university in Delaware. It offers three associate's programs, 148 bachelor's programs, 121 ma ...

. She has an MS in operations research and an MA in economics. She is married and lives in

Seattle, Washington Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest region ...

with her husband and daughter.

Career

Her first novel ''The Twentieth Wife'' is about how a young widow named Mehrunissa, daughter of Persian refugees and wife of an Afghan commander, becomes Empress of the Mughal Empire under the name of Nur Jahan. Her second novel ''The Feast of Roses'' is the sequel to ''The Twentieth Wife'' and focuses on Nur Jahan exerting authority granted by her husband

Jahangir Nur-ud-Din Muhammad Salim (30 August 1569 – 28 October 1627), known by his imperial name Jahangir (; ), was the fourth Mughal Emperor, who ruled from 1605 until he died in 1627. He was named after the Indian Sufi saint, Salim Chishti. Ear ...

during the sixteen years of her marriage to the emperor. ''Shadow Princess'' is the third novel in the Taj trilogy set after the succession of

Shahjahan Shihab-ud-Din Muhammad Khurram (5 January 1592 – 22 January 1666), better known by his regnal name Shah Jahan I (; ), was the fifth emperor of the Mughal Empire, reigning from January 1628 until July 1658. Under his emperorship, the Mugha ...

(Prince Khurram) whose chief queen

Mumtaz Mahal Mumtaz Mahal (/'/; ), born Arjumand Banu Begum (27 April 1593 – 17 June 1631) was the empress consort of the Mughal Empire from 19 January 1628 to 17 June 1631 as the chief consort of the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan. The Taj Mahal in Agra, oft ...

dies in childbirth and then their daughter, Jahanara takes centre stage in the politics of the court. She is also the author of ''The Splendor of Silence'', historical fiction set in a fictional Indian princely state just before Indian independence in 1947. Her work has been translated into some 23 languages worldwide. Her short fiction has appeared in The Vincent Brothers Review and on iVillage.com.

Awards

Washington State Book Award The Washington State Book Awards is a literary awards program presented annually in recognition of notable books written by Washington authors in the previous year. The program was established in 1967 as the Governor's Writers Awards. Each year, ...

for ''The Twentieth Wife'' in 2003. * Light of India award for Excellence in Literature

Works

;Taj Mahal trilogy * ''Twentieth Wife'' (2002) * ''The Feast of Roses'' (2003) * ''Shadow Princess'' (2010) ; Other * ''The Splendour of Silence'' (2006) * ''In the Convent of Little Flowers'' (2008) * ''The Mountain of Light'' (2013)

References

External links

* , essay by the author
"An Interview with Novelist Indu Sundaresan"
''California Literary Review'', 3 April 2007. Living people Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century American novelists American novelists of Indian descent American women writers of Indian descent Indian emigrants to the United States University of Delaware alumni 21st-century American women writers American women novelists {{India-writer-stub