Sanjay Gupta's Case of the 'Mondays'

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN’s chief medical correspondent, celebrated the launch of his latest book Monday Mornings at a party held at the Setai Hotel in New York Tuesday evening.

In addition to his role at CNN, Gupta is a practicing neurosurgeon, prompting CNN president Jim Walton to call him “possibly the busiest human being I have ever met” in his remarks at the party.

Gupta is the author of two other books, but Monday Mornings is his first novel, about a group of surgeons at the fictional Chelsea General who confront their failings at weekly Morbidity and Mortality conference. TNT has picked up a pilot based on the book, dubbed Chelsea General, with David E. Kelley attached as writer and executive produce.

“These are incredible moments in life. They are also fairly awkward occasions as well – it almost makes me not want to write another book,” the modest Gupta told party attendees. “I loved the idea of being able to create something of fiction, something I’d never done before and teach people something about hospitals. It’s not a hospital populated by superheroes in scrubs – people have flaws, personally and professionally, and this book talks about that in a very unadulterated way.”

Topping the list of boldface names in attendance at the party was former President Bill Clinton, who made a surprise appearance and held court for a scrum of CNN execs and onlookers for about an hour. Plenty of TV types stopped by to congratulate Gupta, including talk show host Dr. Mehmet Oz, ABC News’ Katie Couric, The Daily Show’s Aasif Mandvi, Fox News Channel’s Bill Hemmer, former CNN anchor Kiran Chetry and CBS News president David Rhodes.

CNN brass was also out in full force: CNN/U.S. EVP Ken Jautz, SVP of programming Bart Feder, managing editor Mark Whitaker, HLN chief Scot Safon, managing director of CNN International Tony Maddox and Piers Morgan Tonight EP Jonathan Wald, as well as network on-air talent Soledad O’Brien, Ivan Watson, Ashleigh Banfield, Don Lemon and Christine Romans, among others.

Gupta and Clinton

Chetry, Lemon and Romans

Jautz, Gupta, Whitaker, Walton

Photo credit: Lorenzo Bevilaqua/CNN