Rohinton Mistry was born in 1952 in Bombay (now Mumbai). He graduated with a degree in mathematics from the University of Bombay in 1974 and immigrated to Canada with his wife the following year, settling in Toronto. 

Mistry wrote his first short story, “One Sunday,” in 1983, winning first prize in the Canadian Hart House Literary Contest (an award he also won the following year for his short story “Auspicious Occasion”). It was followed in 1985 by the Annual Contributors’ Award from Canadian Fiction Magazine, and he then received a Canada Council grant, whereupon he left his job as a bank clerk and became a full-time writer.