Tulika Book Buzz

Birdywood Beat
The children of Nalanda School, Mumbai, grooved to the sounds of the Birdywood Beat with writer Shamim Padamsee, who did a storytelling session with The Great Birdywood Games. Woo-hoot!

Jadoo at Kitab Khana

The teachers of Ascend International School, Mumbai, did a wonderful bilingual reading of The Magic Feather at Kitab Khana on Saturday 11th December 2012. Varsha read the Hindi version and simultaneously, Kelly read the English version of this delightful book, written and illustrated by Roma Singh.  The reading was followed by a fun book-decorating craft project. Three cheers for reading!

Bambooing
Writer and storyteller Praba Ram did a read-aloud session at Kangaroo Kids on November 30th. One of the books she chose to read out from was Tulika’s Bulbuli’s Bamboo. “I thoroughly enjoyed poring over the rich, vibrant colours of the illustrations in this book… The lively play on prepositions makes each page a pleasure to read-aloud,” says Praba Ram, in this review of Bulbuli’s Bamboo. 

Paploodum

“Every page in this book is a natural conversation starter, so there’s no end to how far the imaginations can soar when you and your child sit with a book like this,” says Richa Jha, in this review of Why Paploo Was Perplexed.

The Rambunctious Rakshasa Rhyme

Bondas, Birds and More:Shamim Padamsee at Bookaroo 2012

Writer and educationist Shamim Padamsee has published many books with Tulika. Her first, Dancing on Walls, a fantasy story on how Warli art may have been born, is hugely popular as is A Silly Story of Bondapalli. Birdywood Buzz: The Vulture Returns, a zippy take on filmdom, and its sequel, The Great Birdywood Games, a cool take on the Olympic Games, are together a wonderful introduction to birdlife. 

Keenly interested in early childhood education, the environment and wildlife, Shamim pursues all her passions with equal zeal and started Young India Books, a website which reviews and promotes Indian children's books.

Here is Shamim in action at Bookaroo 2012!

"Alongside evocative illustrations by Soumya Menon, Padamsee has woven nuggets of information into the narrative"

Time Out

"The book not only has an entertainment, but an educational value as well. Characteristics of the birds are subtly woven with the story, which only one with a good understanding of birds can write."

Udaipur Times

"The imagery is delightful and it keeps you hovering right above in the sky as each bird makes its entry... The text is plain and lucid, but each bird attribute researched by the author will definitely make the reader want to find out more about each bird she/he encounters."

Donna Reen

"....cleverly encompasses the issue of self esteem! A perfect edutainment book."

Buzzing Books on Birdywood Buzz

"Bondapalli celebrates being round and fat and happy...Awesome illustrations, low word count, cheerful narratives endeared these tales to my five year old."

Saffron Tree

"Reading A Silly Story of Bondapalli is a delight precisely because the teller of this story is not standing on a high pedestal and teaching the readers any moral lessons."

The Book Review


"Shamim Padamsee's 'The Silly Story of Bondapalli', published by Tulika, is a wonderful story not only for children but also for adults, who want to have a good laugh after a stressful day. Simply 'Bondastic'!"

Blogger Hema  

"Children wills enjoy the bouncy rhythm of the story and cheer at the slapstick war that culminates at the end of the tale."

Ruhi Gurjar

My Adventures with Night

Junuka Deshpande is an artist, filmmaker and teacher. She likes to explore methods and forms of documenting and understanding people and their environment in an involved, collaborative, non-hierarchical and just way. She feels that it’s important to reach out to different kinds of children through art, storytelling and books. Junuka is the author and illustrator of the bilingual picture book, Night. 

“The head is like a cat but the body is like a tiger!”

A little voice came from somewhere in the audience. I was conducting a storytelling session at Buzz Book Club, Coimbatore, based on my book, Night, published by Tulika. The idea of the illustration was to suggest a tiger (which could be a cat) that the characters in the book spotted and ran away from. 

I started searching for the girl who had so spontaneously declared her view and finally saw her. She was smaller than the chair she was sitting on, but her eyes were wide and sparkling! I felt honoured as a visual storyteller.

Initially, I was apprehensive about talking about the black and white imaginative experimental illustrations in the book. Children are usually given colourful and ‘attractive’ visual material. My apprehension was about the newness of the black and white concept. I was proven wrong by the children. They took a deep interest in every page, expressing exactly what they thought. It was a good idea to project the illustrations on the screen in a size larger than life. 

We began with a small experiment. We switched off the lights and sat quietly with our eyes shut. Let’s pretend that the room is a forest, I said. As I talked, I moved about in the hall and on their own, children began mimicking animal sounds and bird calls. Later, we had a discussion based on all the different sounds we heard and imagined what it would be like if we too set off on a journey too – just like the two children in the book!

There is an illustration of a jungle where one of the trees has little elephants on it. The adults wanted to know why, but the children naturally accepted it. I was curious. Why are they elephants on the tree, I asked. One loud voice cried, “The children are fascinated by the forest so they are seeing like that!” 

I wrapped up with a drawing session where each child drew his/her own idea of the night. It was very interesting to see some of their interpretations.

The other event I did with Night was in broad daylight, at a children’s festival by Yellow Train, an alternative school in Coimbatore. In this session, we looked at the book and talked about each visual working around the idea of telling stories through drawings. 

The children in the group were very articulate and they seemed well-exposed to the world of books. I would love to make books with them based on their own stories and imagination – who knows how many author-illustrators one will find!