ABRAHAM VERGHESE is a graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and the author of the The Tennis Partner, Cutting for Stone, and The Covenant of Water, which was an instant New York Times bestseller, an Oprah's Book Club Pick, and sold more than two million copies worldwide. Verghese was awarded the National Humanities Medal by President Obama, has received six honorary degrees, and is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is the Linda R. Meier and Joan F. Lane Provostial Professor in the Department of Medicine at the Stanford University School of Medicine.