Rajani LaRocca is a physician and award-winning author of books for young people. She was born in Bangalore, India, immigrated to the U.S. as a baby, and spent most of her childhood in Louisville, Kentucky. A graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Medical School, she trained in Internal Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, where she’s been working as a primary care internal medicine physician since 2001. She lives in eastern Massachusetts with her family and impossibly cute dog.
Rajani has always been an omnivorous reader of novels, nonfiction, comic books, and cereal boxes. She is now an omnivorous writer of award-winning books for young readers: novels and picture books, fiction and nonfiction, in prose and poetry. Her middle grade novel in verse, Red, White, and Whole, won a 2022 Newbery Honor, the 2022 Walter Dean Myers Award, the 2022 Golden Kite Award, and the 2021 New England Book Award, as well as other honors. She is the author of numerous other acclaimed novels and picture books, including Midsummer’s Mayhem, Seven Golden Rings, and more. She also co-hosts the STEM Women in KidLit Podcast.
The books Rajani read as a child helped shape who she is today in ways she’s still discovering. Books inspired her to pursue medicine, made her yearn to live in different worlds, and helped her consider what it’s like to walk in someone else’s shoes. A lifelong book lover, she never saw herself in a book until she was an adult—and when she did, it was world-changing and mind-blowing. She believes that everyone deserves to see themselves in the pages of a book; that writing and reading diversely promotes empathy; and empathy makes the world a better place.
“Rajani LaRocca shared her personal experience of becoming an author and the journey that led her to writing. She emphasized the importance of using writing as a form of healing and encouraged the audience to embrace the many different interests and passions they may have. One message that stood out was that we do not have to choose just one thing to become in life—we can pursue many paths and become many things. Her story was inspiring, engaging, and meaningful.” — Utah Valley University, 2026
