Author Archives: Thebookreviewindia

As you grow older, several unpleasant problems must be confronted. Amongst them falls the inevitable consequence of children growing up, leaving home, stubbornly refusing to take their effects with them and angrily refusing to let you give them away.

Indian mythology is a complex maze of stories within stories revolving around the amazing exploits of gods and goddesses, saints and sinners, and creatures dark and bright. Our ancient scriptures are full of these fabulous tales that tell of births and rebirths, boons, blessings and curses. They are veritably a part of the Indian subconscious mind…

Vanita is a unique child…

The main characters of this rather captivating and sometimes scary book is a duo—Meenakshi and Kalban. Meenakshi is the daughter of Kalban’s teacher who is from a different land. Kalban studies in Meenakshi’s father’s study whereas Meenakshi studies in her father’s library.

Everless is all about seventeen-year-old Jules who has arrived at Everless, the estate of the Gerling family—a place which she detests and fears, in order to earn time for her dying father. In our world, we work to earn money to pay our taxes, bills and rent.

Morrigan Crow, daughter of Chancellor Corvus Crow, is born on Eventide. Those unfortunate enough to be born on this day, are predestined to die on their 12th birthday. As a ‘cursed child’, she is blamed for random catastrophes that happen in her home town of Jackalfax, from hailstones and heart attacks, to ruined batches of marmalade.

The Land of Stories: Worlds Collide is an adventure fantasy novel written by Chris Colfer, whose name kept niggling me, as I read this book. Yet it was only after I finished reading the book that I was surprised to find that the author was an actor in one of my favourite television series, Glee.

This book is an encyclopedia of wild animals. The various ani-mal species, their way of life, what they eat, where they live, their life span, where are they found, etc.—everything is explained vividly and in great detail. I think this is a book worth keeping in schools and in homes with school-going children.

This book is a collection of four award-winning articles on environment. ‘Tapti Dharti Ilaaj Mange’ and ‘Paryawaran Sanrakshran’ were awarded in a CBT competition in non-fiction category on environment. The other two are taken from an English language book SOS from Nature.

This unique little book complements the title Walking is a Way of Knowing by the same authors and illustrator. This is a collection of unusual folklore from the world of the Kadars. It tells the story of how Kadavul the creator created the Kadars or hill people and blessed them with gifts of edible leaves, honey, tubers, herbs and incense, all hidden in the forest.

Two books based on oral stories of the Kadars, a small adivasi tribe in South India, have been written by Madhuri Ramesh and Manish Chandi who spent much time with the Kadars in their forest. The Kadars no longer live in the dense jungle but they walk its uneven, muddy paths every day.

What an attractive and unusual cover…the ferocious tiger is behind bars! The hard cover of this book has effective cut-outs of bars and the snarling tiger is crouched behind them, on the first page. The Gond author/artist, Dhavat Singh Uikey tells us that the tiger is an important part of the Gond natural world.

One of the largest tribal communities in the world, the Gonds are found mainly in the forests of central and southern India. They are known for their distinctive art forms with vibrant depictions of local flora, fauna and gods, using natural bright colours.

Stumbling through Life is a collection of twenty-five small essays through which Bond shares various aspects of his life and of human nature, in his unique style of writing, which leaves readers thinking about larger issues in the end. He calls it his mini-autobiography, but it’s encyclopedic.

If your kids have finished reading the first volume of Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls, you can now hand them the second volume to read. The battle to end patriarchy is not over, and so it makes perfect sense to have more books with profiles of more wonderful women for the young ones to learn about.

Like A Girl is a collection of stories of 51 women. Many of these women are not unknown to us, several of them are celebrities. The women featured in this book range from 19th century heroes like Rani Laxmibai to contemporary trailblazers such as Dipa Karmikar. Along the way you read about the extraordinary Amrita Shergill, Leila Seth and Soni Sori.

Judge this book by its cover. A hand-drawn elephant, a monkey, a tortoise, a bird, a butterfly, and a somewhat rakish, thin, balding man with sunglasses border a background of dappled sunlit green. Welcome to the world of forests, its denizens and India’s eminent ecologist, Rauf Ali.

Sheshagiri Rao’s maiden book is a memoir—about a teacher who altered his perspective of a subject and turned his life around. Rao, an education specialist, shows us that any subject can be made interesting to the students if the teacher wills it so.

Many people know Sachin as a famous cricketer, some even believe that he is the best player of the game. But not many people know about his very gruelling and challenging past, which I think we must know to appreciate him. He is a very hard-working person and I think we can all change by reading his autobiography.

You can be different, yet lead a meaningful life and live up to your potential. You can be happy and successful too. Be yourself and do your best is what each story from the book seems to say. Stories for Boys Who Dare to be Different has some amazing stories that warm the cockles of your heart! Here’s a small peek into the book…