Kunal Basu was born in Calcutta. Educated in India and the United States, he has lived in many countries. A Professor of Marketing, he has taught at McGill University, Canada and at Oxford University, England. He is the author of three acclaimed novels: The Opium Clerk based on 19th century's opium trade, The Miniaturist set in Mughal India, and most recently, Racists , which delves into the world of Victorian racial science. He speaks frequently at literary festivals, and critical commentary of his work has appeared in Romancing the Strange: The Fiction of Kunal Basu , published by the Shakespeare Society of India. He is married with one daughter.