Award-winning author and poet, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is widely known for her novels, Sister of My Heart, The Mistress of Spices, The Vine of Desire and Queen of Dreams. Translated into 11 languages, including Dutch, Hebrew and Japanese, her other writings include two prize-winning short story collections, two volumes of poetry, and her novels for young children. Among the awards and citations she has are the O. Henry Prize, two Pushcart Prizes, and the American Book Award. Born in India, she currently lives in Texas where she teaches creative writing at the University of Houston.|In a dingy shack in the less-than-desirable Indian neighbourhood he calls home, twelve-year-old Anand is entrusted with a conch shell that possesses mystical powers. His task is to return the shell to its rightful home many hundreds of miles away in the Himalayas. Accompanying him are Nisha, a headstrong but resourceful child of the streets, and a mysterious man of indeterminate age and surprising resources named Abhaydatta. Him quest takes him farther from home than he's ever been and teaches him more than he ever imagined and forces him to make a poignant decision that changes him forever.