I grew up in Manchester, the daughter of a botanist and a South African Indian immigrant who became a mental health social worker. I spent much of my childhood in the Herbarium of Manchester Museum, where my father worked and on which the Herbarium in The Blue Poppy is based. I travelled widely with my parents on botanical expeditions and, later in life, independently. I studied law at Oxford and practiced in London for twelve years.
The Blue Poppy won The Owned Voices Novel Award 2021 and was also long listed for the Bridport Prize First Novel Award 2019, under its previous title ‘The Alchemy of Botany’. It was selected for the Asian Women Writer’s program 2022.
