We need more illustrated middle-grade books!I read When Fairyland Lots Its Magic on my way to Kolkata for the Junior Kolkata Literary Meet, and there was so much to love about it! The way Bijal Vachharajani plays with fairytales (like Gretel and Hansel), the comments about odd names (Little Red Riding Hood? Who names a child after the clothes she wears?), and the puns about pages and trolls ... delightful!At the JKLM, Bijal and I were in conversation, purportedly about storifying important issues such as climate change and democracy through fairy tales and fantasy. Of course, we did talk about issues and why they find their way into fiction, but we also spoke about the joy of stories and the things we do when we write. We spoke of magic, and how we find it in nature, in ourselves, and between the pages of a book.Retelling fairytales with the idea of the climate crisis … [Read more...]
My Year in Writing: 2023
The year 2023 was remarkably kind to me as an author. It was a year full of lit fests, school visits, and, most importantly, new stories! UncontrollableWhat can I say about Uncontrollable, my first verse novel?'Addictive.''Unputdownable.''Ambitious and original.'I keep going back and reading all these heart-warming emails I've received about it.Yes, it is ambitious. It is a middle-grade fantasy in verse. In November 2023, I was shortlisted for the Neev Literature Festival fellowship. During the interview, I met six children's literature experts, and they mentioned how they'd hunted for other examples of fantasy written in verse ... and had drawn a blank.They thought of Odder by Katherine Applegate, but it isn't really fantasy; the protagonist is an animal, but the book is realistic fiction nonetheless.So maybe, Uncontrollable is really one of its kind. It's both terrifying and … [Read more...]
My Favourite Late Middle-Grade and Young Adult Books from 2023
As usual, I begin my list of favourite young adult books wishing I had read more YA last year. Yes, I loved these books, but once more, I hope to read more young adult in 2024! Schooled Schooled is such a delightful read, featuring a quirky, fun character.I read many negative reviews about the book, which spoke of how it perpetuates stereotypes of homeschooled children not knowing how to behave in social settings, but that wasn't how I read the book at all! I made no generalisations about homeschoolers or, indeed, hippies, as I read--I enjoyed the book for what it was, a heartwarming story about a character I was rooting for! Book review The District Cup The District Cup recently won the Atta Galatta Bangalore Literature Festival prize for children's fiction, an award for which my Dhara's Revolution was shortlisted too! … [Read more...]
My Favourite Middle-Grade Books from 2023
It's only when I began writing this post that I noticed that most (six out of seven) of my favourite middle-grade reads from 2023 have blue covers! How odd!I made a conscious effort to read more middle-grade books this year, also because I want to write more middle grade. It's an age-group I enjoy interacting with, and I want more MG literature that moves and changes me, urging me to read on. Here are the books that I read and loved in 2023. An Alien in the Jam Factory I read this wacky book at the end of November 2023, and I loved it so much that it's going to be part of the February 2024 edition of Read, Write, Explore. An Alien in the Jam Factory is a book that I think most children can identify with, even though the protagonist is a genius who meets an alien, a situation that most children cannot identify with. What makes me feel it has … [Read more...]
The Losers Club
We've loved books by Andrew Clements at my book club. Of course, Frindle is a favourite, but About Average was fun too. The Losers Club, which I read about a month ago, came as a recommendation from a parent, and it was quite a lovely choice. A book about books--what's not to love about it?All Alec wants to do is to get lost in his book. When he learns that he needs to be part of a club to be allowed to sit and read after school, he forms one, determined not to attract a crowd. He wants to read. That's it. Nothing more than that. He decides that the best way to ensure that no one wants to join his club is to call it the Losers Club.Things don't go to plan, though, and soon, it seems like everyone wants to be part of his club. As more tables are added and more enthusiastic young children join in, Alec needs to decide whether to be dictatorial and enforce his ideas, or listen to … [Read more...]
Schooled
I stumbled upon Schooled by Gordon Korman by chance and read it in one sitting. What a lovely, fun book, full of unexpected twists and turns!Capricorn Andersen (Cap for short) has spent all his life at Garland Farm, homeschooled by his hippie grandmother, Rain. When Rain falls off a tree, Cap is launched into the world outside, utterly ill-equipped to deal with school, money, and life in general. An oddball with practically no survival instincts and no skills to cope with the world outside Garland, Cap is such a delightful, surprising character--alternating between freakazoid (as one character calls him) and angel (as another character discovers). I loved it!Often, when a book gets a little too intense or the character does something that is bound to have awful consequences, I have to step away and breathe a little. I need to prepare myself for what will happen next because I … [Read more...]
Gathering Blue
Gathering Blue opens with an unknown character in an unknown world. Sure, it is a dystopian world, but I found myself wondering, isn't this the second book in The Giver quartet? I even went back to check that I hadn't started reading the wrong book by mistake. I hadn't. Yet, there were no overlapping characters that I could find.Soon enough, however, one similarity between the two books stood out: the utter isolation of the community in which Kira, the protagonist of Gathering Blue, lives. Like Jonas, Kira has no knowledge of the world outside. She has heard of beasts that will drag you away, and she has even heard them growl, but she has never seen a beast. She has never ventured off the beaten path, and has never dared to go beyond the Field.Where Jonas's world is too perfect, Kira's is cutthroat. When her mother dies, the other women, led by the scarred Vandara, want to take … [Read more...]
The Giver
Teaching creative writing is always eye-opening. Over time, we've worked with mythopoeia, dystopia, fantasy, adventure, and mystery, requiring us to come up with all kinds of mentor texts and examples. During the April to June 2023 edition of the programme, somehow, we kept coming back to The Giver by Lois Lowry, a book I had not read. I finally remedied that!The Giver is a powerful dystopian story, one that fills the reader with yearning. Jonas lives in the perfect community. Every morning, each family unit discusses dreams. Every night, family units discuss feelings. There is no loss, there's no needless pain, and there's no suffering. The community functions like a well-oiled machine. Each individual has a clear role to play, and when it is time, they are released from the community.Even as we read about this perfect, comfortable life, we have a niggling sense of … [Read more...]
The Wild Robot
Reading The Wild Robot with one of my book clubbers was quite the experience.'Do you think a robot can experience emotions?' I asked.'Yes,' came the confident reply, which took me by surprise.'Why would you say that?''Because it's artificial intelligence, which learns. If it can learn other things, why can't it learn to experience emotion?'And with this conversation, we started reading The Wild Robot, the story of Roz the robot, who hatches out of a crate that is washed up on the shore of a wild island. A group of curious otters turns her on with a click, and Roz springs to life--artificial life.Through Roz, author Peter Brown forces us to be curious and ask questions that have no single correct answer. For instance, how does a robot with Survival Instincts differ from an animal? Can robots experience guilt? As a student of philosophy, I remember studying several theories … [Read more...]
Postcard from the Lushai Brigade
What a beautiful addition to the Songs of Freedom series! Reminiscent of Private Peaceful although for a younger audience, Postcard from the Lushai Brigade is the story of a pair of brothers. And just like Michael Morpurgo's Private Peaceful, it is told from the point of view of a younger brother who idolises the elder, and the elder seems worthy of his adulation. Young Bawiha's brother Kima is everything that is perfect--generous, caring and brave. He seems larger than life, someone whom everyone loves. Yet, Kima always has time for his younger brother, and together, the boys watch stars, play make-believe, and listen to Api's enchanting stories.But perhaps Api is right. Perhaps the sap--the white Britishers--are nothing but trouble. Maybe they need to go. Maybe their battles are not the battles of the people of India. But when Mrs McCall who lives in the big bungalow is nothing … [Read more...]