For our March Narrative Medicine Rounds, we welcome Sayantani DasGupta, MD MPH, who teaches in the Master’s Program in Narrative Medicine, the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race, and the Institute of Comparative Literature and Society at Columbia University. Dr. DasGupta will be speaking about writing her novel, The Serpent’s Secret, which is the first book in the new Kiranmala and the Kingdom Beyond series just published by Scholastic Press. March Narrative Medicine Rounds are co-sponsored by the Program in Narrative Medicine, the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race and Reflexions: The Literary and Fine Arts Journal of Columbia University Medical Center. Dr. DasGupta, the daughter of Indian immigrants, wanted to share her love of books with her own kids but was saddened by the lack of heroes that looked like her family and neighbors. She decided to write her own stories, returning to the folktales filled with bloodthirsty demons and enchanted animals that she heard on childhood trips to India. Originally trained in pediatrics and public health, Dr. DasGupta is also the author, co-author or co-editor of several books, including a book of Bengali folktales, The Demon Slayers and Other Stories (Interlink 1995), and the recent Principles and Practice of Narrative Medicine (Oxford 2016).