At just seventeen years old, teenage author Rishi Razdan has already established a remarkable voice in contemporary literature. Growing up across the contrasting cultural landscapes of London and Mumbai, he experienced firsthand the nuances of straddling multiple worlds—often feeling “too British to be Indian” in one city, and “too Indian to be British” in the other. Channelling these formative experiences into both fiction and deeply introspective nonfiction, Razdan explores the complex realities of adolescence, identity, migration, and the universal search for belonging.
His acclaimed work, Of Many Grounds: Finding Home Between Worlds, bridges personal memoir with imaginative storytelling, offering a profound perspective on growing up between cultures.
Razdan’s journey as a writer began long before his teenage years. Sparked by a childhood filled with bedtime stories read by his Aji (grandmother) and fueled by a desire to recreate that literary magic, he began writing his own fictional adventures around age eight. Reflecting on his evolution from an outward-looking child writing fantasy to an introspective author exploring human identity, Razdan notes, “The little boy who used to get read bedtime stories every night is still there; he has simply found new things to write about. Belonging isn’t a question I need to answer once and for all. It’s something I continue to build, one question at a time.”
Moving between international schools in Mumbai and London exposed Razdan to many peers sharing similar cross-cultural upbringings—children heavily influenced by what is often called the “Third Culture Kid” framework. Rather than aiming to deliver definitive answers, his book leans into the beautiful ambiguity of growing up in transition. He explains, “I wanted to leave readers with questions of their own, rather than simply offer answers. I hope readers come away feeling that they don’t need to fit neatly into one category… and that in doing so, we can learn to embrace the various experiences, cultures, and influences that make us who we are.”
Razdan’s writing process relies on a delicate harmony between raw personal essay and imaginative fiction. While nonfiction pieces like “A Path Along the Serpentine”—which explores his relationship with his father across continents—offer grounding vulnerability, fiction allows him to safely examine emotional truths from a distance. Describing his approach to honesty on the page, he shares, “Authentic experiences, thoughts, and emotions help make stories feel real… Writing is my way of making sense of experiences and emotions that I might otherwise struggle to articulate, even to myself.”
Having navigated the daunting process of transitioning from unstructured, spontaneous ideas to publishing a cohesive book, Razdan offers practical, counterintuitive wisdom to other young people eager to tell their stories. “Don’t think about writing a book! Keep your expectations in check: nobody expects a teenager to write the next Harry Potter, but let your curiosity guide you more than anything. It was only when I stopped trying to force a book into existence and began exploring ideas that genuinely interested me that Of Many Grounds started to take shape.”
