Author Archives: Thebookreviewindia

This book appears to have been nurtured by the warmth of the desert winds and the colours of sand. The empathy and sensitivity in the relationship between humans and animals in the desert-land depicted in the story touches the reader deeply. Images of the travelling camel caravans visiting my city every summer came alive in my mind while reading the book.

Vinod Kumar Shukla’s new creation—Gamle Mein Jungle—takes us on a sailing boat into the deep seas of imagination.Are we any different from the rest of nature? Can we live in harmony with all other living beings? Be it a river, mountain, tree or elephant—what kind of relationship do we have with them? Are we trying to rule over them? Can we let all be as they are?

Teesra Dost by Vinod Kumar Shukla is a delightful offering by Ektara Publications. Going by the number of words and pages, one might think of it as a short story. But as you get into the story and especially if you have read Vinod Kumar Shukla before and know his writing style, this perception changes.

Bagh Bhi Padhte Hain written by Chandan Yadav and illustrated by Amrita is a short story collection. Most of the characters are animals which might remind you of folktales but on reading you realize that these take on the content with a touch of humour and eventually arrive at practical, kind and humane resolutions.

Andhere ke paar is a story of a young boy, SP, about 10-11 years old, from a middle-class (well-to-do) urban nuclear family, who is facing bullying by his schoolmates. Reading ahead, we realize that along with bullying, there’s also a dynamic of ‘unmet’ parental expectations and consequent disappointments that have led the boy’s struggle with his self-esteem, gradually leading to depression.

The book Zameen Humko Ghumati Hai is an interestingly inquisitive poem of how the author questions the wonders of nature, particularly the earth. Throughout the book and the poem, the author states his astonishment at the many attributes of nature.

Amra Aur Dayan is the story of a boy of about 10-12 years of age. It is the story of a day when Amra gets a feeling that everything is going to go wrong. In this day full of troubles, he has the company of his friend Virma. The day of troubles is so grave that Amra is forced to visit the hut of ‘Jeevti Dayan’.

Written in the wake of the Kedarnath flash floods of 2013, Himmat Sawar gives a fictional twist to the devastating events that unfolded during the flood. A novel for children, the book attempts to initiate a conversation between literature and ecology by bringing together the relationship between humans, animals, and the physical environment

Life is akin to an amusement park and birth itself is an entry ticket. Exposure to as many experiences as possible is normal to a person fascinated by life.’ The author lived by his words and the book is a testimonial to it. The book presents snippets from his boyhood to adult life and in no particular order.

When I was to select a book for reviewing, the title Bana Banaya Dekha Aakash, Bante Kahan Dikha Aakash itself drew me towards this book. As if it was asking me, ‘Have you ever seen something like this?’ And the cover illustration too appears to have assimilated all living and non-living beings into the folds of the sky.

On hearing the word melancholia, I imagine—crooning of a musical instrument, the sound of the rain, evenings spent in solitude, sailing on the boat during sunset, reading a pensive book, having a conversation with a person who lends an open ear and objective mind, watching sky change its colour, gazing stars under the night sky.

Vinod Kumar Shukla’s Ghoda aur Anya Kahaniyan has six stories apart from the one titled ‘Ghoda’. These are : ‘Bahiya’, ‘Cinema Line’, ‘Heera’, ‘Kotwar’, ‘Sacchai ki duniya’ and ‘Gali-mohalle ki Jalvayu’.‘Bahiya’, alias a madman, replies to all questions people ask him in a particular pattern. The mystery of his unique ways and the pattern of his answering questions is revealed later in the story.

Around five-six years ago, it would have been easy to say that nothing was happening in the world of Marathi children’s literature. I would have simply left my comment at that. But since the situation today has changed, it needs a mention as well. It is high time that we acknowledge the bits and pieces of contributions and explorations, initiated and ongoing despite the odds.

This series of 30 early grade readers has been developed in Marathi by Pratham Books to support guided and independent reading in grades 1-3, when children are learning to read.It is now widely recognized by educationists (though not practiced in most of our schools) that textbooks alone are insufficient for teaching learning of language and literacy.

Children’s Literature in Telugu is said to have had a golden period during the decades of 1960s and 1970s when a monthly magazine Chandamama was very popular. It was published in more than ten Indian languages. It had a fairly common structure with two-three serials, a Vikram and Vetal story and other stories dealing with test of honesty, cleverness and spontaneity, finding a successor to the throne or a bride for the son.

A painting could be worth a thousand words but a picture book is worth much more, since the illustrations contribute much more to the story than the text. A series of ten Telugu picture books was published by Manchi Pustakam in association with Telugu Association of North America (TANA) in November 2021. Each of these books, adorned with colourful illustrations, is twenty-four pages long. Here is a sneak peek into what the books have in store for the readers.

If I recall my childhood, we grew up surrounded by books, books of all kinds. Many of them had beautiful illustrations. Children and books were as if integrated.There were many authors in Bangla who used to write for children and all were among the established ones such as Upendra Kishore Roy Choudhury, Leela Majumdar, Bibhutibhushan Bandopadhyay, Tarasankar Bandopadhyay, Sukumar Ray, Sharad Chandra Chattopadhyay.

A few months ago, I watched the film Back to the Future, an American science fiction film made in three parts. There, the protagonist, Marty, and his friend move across time and space, to the future to save lives and to the past for solving scientific experiments that have gone askew. Science fiction has been a part of various art forms in the West for centuries.

This is a ‘novel for adolescents’, a thing that is hard to define.  But the necessary condition for an adult writing a ‘novel for the adolescents’ is that the writer must return to her own adolescence, because years of growing up alter the life of the writer significantly as compared to the life projected in the story. Yet, the writer retains a flow of perspective on the world and life, and on the philosophical outlook.

True to the genre of science fiction, this volume is teeming with aliens and spaceships, time travel, robots, the future world and amazing scientific inventions that tempt wrong-doers and children alike. A wonderful collection of sci-fi short stories that will tantalize young minds.The stories are told from the perspective of a child-hero who interacts with the adult world or even aliens on his own terms.