The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer is a book written by Siddhartha Mukherjee

Siddhartha Mukherjee

Siddhartha Mukherjee is an Indian-born American physician, scientist and writer. He authored the 2010 book, The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer, which won the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction...

, an India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

n-born American physician and oncologist. Published in 2010 by Scribner

Charles Scribner's Sons

Charles Scribner's Sons, or simply Scribner, is an American publisher based in New York City, known for publishing a number of American authors including Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Kurt Vonnegut, Stephen King, Robert A. Heinlein, Thomas Wolfe, George Santayana, John Clellon...

, it won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction: the jury said the book was elegantly written. The book weaves together Mukherjee's experiences as a hematology

Hematology

Hematology, also spelled haematology , is the branch of biology physiology, internal medicine, pathology, clinical laboratory work, and pediatrics that is concerned with the study of blood, the blood-forming organs, and blood diseases...

/oncology

Oncology

Oncology is a branch of medicine that deals with cancer...

 fellow

Fellowship (medicine)

A fellowship is the period of medical training in the United States and Canada that a physician may undertake after completing a specialty training program . During this time , the physician is known as a fellow...

 at Massachusetts General Hospital

Massachusetts General Hospital

Massachusetts General Hospital is a teaching hospital and biomedical research facility in the West End neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts...

 as well as the history of cancer treatment and research. Mukherjee states that two of his influences for the book were Randy Shilts

Randy Shilts

Randy Shilts was a pioneering gay American journalist and author. He worked as a freelance reporter for both The Advocate and the San Francisco Chronicle, as well as for San Francisco Bay Area television stations....

' And the Band Played On

And the Band Played On

And the Band Played On: Politics, People, and the AIDS Epidemic is a nonfiction book written by San Francisco Chronicle journalist Randy Shilts, published in 1987...

and Richard Rhodes

Richard Rhodes

Richard Lee Rhodes is an American journalist, historian, and author of both fiction and non-fiction , including the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Making of the Atomic Bomb , and most recently, The Twilight of the Bombs...

' The Making of the Atomic Bomb

The Making of the Atomic Bomb

The Making of the Atomic Bomb, a book written by Richard Rhodes, won the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction, a National Book Award and a National Book Critics Circle Award...

, but the defining moment for him was "when he conceived of his book as a biography".

It was shortlisted for the 2011 Wellcome Trust Book Prize

Wellcome Trust Book Prize

Wellcome Trust Book Prize is an annual British literary award sponsored by Wellcome Trust. In keeping with the vision and goals of Wellcome Trust, the Book Prize honors "the best of medicine in literature", including fiction and non-fiction. The winner receives £25,000.The current prize for...

, which honors "the best of medicine in literature".