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© Copyright 2013 - 2025
Varsha Seshan

You Bring the Distant Near

September 20, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

You Bring the Distant Near has been on my TBR for a few years now. Yet, I never got around to reading it because I often don’t enjoy sagas that span generations. The cover says, ‘Five girls. Three generations. One great American love story.’ I wondered if I wanted to read a book spanning generations. […]

Filed Under: Books Tagged With: books for tweens, Mitali Perkins, reading, review, You Bring the Distant Near, Young Adult

Mules that Fall from the Sky

September 16, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

How does one write about a book like Mules that Fall from the Sky? As adults, we often feel the need to shelter children from anything disturbing or difficult. I wonder, though, whether it’s because we don’t want to think about these things, rather than for any other reason. Mules that Fall from the Sky […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for tweens, Creative Nonfiction, Middle Grade, Nandini Nayar, reading, review

October, October

August 15, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

We live in the woods and we are wild. That’s what eleven-year-old October says, over and over, about her father and her. The woman who is her mother is not like them. She isn’t wild. She left them in the forest, choosing to go closer to civilisation and live with human comforts. And October cannot […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for tweens, Katya Balen, Middle Grade, October October, reading, review

Willodeen

August 5, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

Screechers. Hummingbears. Peacock snails.  I’m always amazed when writers seem to effortlessly bring a fantastical world to life, and Katherine Applegate is a master at it. I came across it first in Crenshaw (one of the top 5 chapter books I read in 2020); Willodeen left me awestruck. Willodeen plays out in a world very much like […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for ages nine and ten, books for tweens, fantasy, Katherine Applegate, Middle Grade, reading, review, Willodeen

Lion of the Sky

July 29, 2025 by Varsha Seshan 2 Comments

I love historical fiction, and I love novels in verse. A middle-grade work of historical fiction in verse? I knew I wanted to read it. And Lion of the Sky by Ritu Hemnani didn’t disappoint. Set in Sindh in August 1947, Lion of the Sky tells the story of Raj and his family, who are […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for tweens, historical fiction, Lion of the Sky, Middle Grade, reading, review, Ritu Hemnani, Verse Novel

If Elephants Could Talk

July 22, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

Temple elephants. I’ve always hated the fact that they exist. I remember during a dance tour once, when everyone lined up to be blessed by the elephant. I stayed away. And like Meenakshi in If Elephants Could Talk, I didn’t say a thing. I didn’t know how to form my words or what to say. […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for ages nine and ten, books for tweens, If Elephants Could Talk, Middle Grade, Ranjeeta Raam, reading, review, Verse Novel

Beverly, Right Here

July 17, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

I never came across Kate DiCamillo’s work as a child. I haven’t read so many of her more famous books—not The Tale of Desperaux or Mercy Watson or any of those. I did read Because of Winn-Dixie with my book club, though, and we loved it! And now, I read Beverly, Right Here, another book […]

Filed Under: Books Tagged With: Beverly Right Here, books for tweens, Kate DiCamillo, Middle Grade, reading, review, Young Adult

Ammini Against the Storm

July 12, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

Ammini Against the Storm is a reflection of the world we live in, a world where the urban rich are immune to the raging storms that destroy the lives of the poor.  Ammini’s parents work hard to send her to a private school so that she can rise above her circumstances and be something other […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: Ammini Against the Storm, books for tweens, climate fiction, Middle Grade, PARI, reading, review, Vishaka George

The Space We’re In

June 23, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

Have you ever read a review that describes a book as being “full of heart”? Katya Balen’s The Space We’re In is exactly that–a book full of heart. It bursts with love and emotion, raw and authentic. And the voice? Perfect. Ten-year-old Frank sometimes resents his brother Max. Max has changed everything with his humming […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for tweens, Katya Balen, middle-grade, reading, review, The Space We're In

Circus Mirandus

June 21, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

I remember the first time I came across the idea that you have to believe in magic for it to be real. I remember my skin tingling, and a kind of excited joy making my hair stand on end. That’s the mood Circus Mirandus creates, although I’m no longer a child reading about magic for […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for tweens, Cassie Beasley, Circus Mirandus, fantasy, Middle Grade, reading, review

The White Lotus

June 15, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

The White Lotus by Aditi Krishnakumar is a gripping work of historical fiction that, like the best kinds of stories, stays with you and makes you think. Layered and sensitive, it is perfectly paced, immersing you in the life and times of a village in south India in the early 20th century. Fourteen-year-old Arali is […]

Filed Under: Books Tagged With: Aditi Krishnakumar, books for tweens, historical fiction, murder mystery, reading, review, The White Lotus, Young Adult

An Absence of Squirrels

June 9, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

A couple of years ago, I finally read The Giver, a book that students at my writing programme recommended to me time and again when we were studying dystopia, mythopoeia, fantasy … almost anything, in fact. And that’s the book that kept coming to mind as I read Aparna Kapur’s An Absence of Squirrels. An […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for ages nine and ten, books for tweens, reading, review

Unplugged

May 21, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

Jett is rich, spoiled, and used to getting his own way. When he takes his mischief-making too far, however, his father packs him off to a place called Oasis where he must live a life completely screen-free. Jett is incredulous. What kind of place is this, where mobile phones are surrendered before you enter? Who […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for tweens, Gordon Korman, Middle Grade, reading, review, Unplugged

A Demon in Dandi

March 31, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

We all know about the infamous salt tax and the march to Dandi. What would the people of Dandi have felt at the time? Were people even aware of this huge political upheaval brewing in various parts of the country? A Demon in Dandi by Lavanya Karthik is part of Duckbill’s Songs of Freedom series, […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: A Demon in Dandi, books for tweens, historical fiction, Lavanya Karthik, Middle Grade, reading, review, Songs of Freedom

Some Places More than Others

March 26, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

Finding your roots can be such a complicated thing. Amara has never visited New York City, where her father grew up, and there’s nothing she wants more than to go meet her father’s family and get to know them. What’s even more intriguing is that even before she goes, she learns tiny things like the […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for tweens, Middle Grade, reading, Renée Watson, review, Some Places More than Others

The Double Life of Danny Day

March 14, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

The Double Life of Danny Day by Mike Thayer is such an unusual book! I haven’t read anything quite like it ever before, and I loved it! Danny Day is unique. He lives every day twice. As a very young child, he doesn’t understand what’s happening to him. He remembers conversations that never happened, and […]

Filed Under: Books, Children Tagged With: books for tweens, Middle Grade, reading, review, The Double Life of Danny Day

The Bridge Home

March 9, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

Eleven-year-old Viji has had enough. Her mother might believe that her father is repentant and will stop abusing her. But when he hits Viji and Rukku, she makes a decision. However harsh life on the streets may be, it is preferable to being home with a drunken, abusive father. And so, Viji takes her sister […]

Filed Under: Books Tagged With: books for tweens, Middle Grade, Padma Venkatraman, reading, review, The Bridge Home

The Letter with the Golden Stamp

March 8, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

The Letter with the Golden Stamp by Onjali Q. Raúf is such a heartwarming story! As a lover of letters (psst: my first novel in letters, The Wall Friends Club, is just out!), I was drawn to the idea of a story about a special letter right away. With an enterprising protagonist at the centre, […]

Filed Under: Books Tagged With: books for ages nine and ten, books for tweens, Middle Grade, Onjali Q Raúf, reading, review, The Letter with the Golden Stamp

Echo

February 5, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

Do you ever read the author’s note and acknowledgements? I love reading them! For example, at the end of Echo, author Pam Muñoz Ryan writes: It was [in the German Harmonica and Accordion Museum in Trossingen] in a glass case that I discovered the letters from thankful family members of soldiers whose lives were once […]

Filed Under: Books Tagged With: books for tweens, Echo, fantasy, historical fiction, Middle Grade, Pam Muñoz Ryan, reading, review

Melissa

January 30, 2025 by Varsha Seshan Leave a Comment

I’ve been meaning to read Melissa for a while, and more so since I read Rick some time ago. It’s an important book for young readers, one that I found myself mulling over long after I’d finished. George knows she is not a boy. She looks like one, and everyone sees her as one, but […]

Filed Under: Books Tagged With: Alex Gino, books for tweens, Melissa, Middle Grade, reading, review

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