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Hidden city

Hidden city

Tales of Historic Delhi: By Premola Ghose,Amber Books and Young Zubaan,64 pages, ₹ 225.Premium

Tales of Historic Delhi: By Premola Ghose,Amber Books and Young Zubaan,64 pages, 225.

Amid the publicity blaze of new novels by star authors such as Amitav Ghosh and Aravind Adiga, the quiet launch of a new book on Delhi went unnoticed. Written and illustrated by Premola Ghose, Tales of Historic Delhi is that rare children’s book that focuses on a city. It has been published by Amber Books in association with Young Zubaan.

Tales of Historic Delhi: By Premola Ghose,Amber Books and Young Zubaan,64 pages, 225.

In recent years, illustrated children’s books from publishing houses such as Puffin, Katha and Tulika, focusing on Indian mythological stories, have been selling well. There have also been books on cities such as Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Bangalore—indicative of an emerging trend of city-specific books for children. In further indication of how the market for young readers is growing, Bahrisons Booksellers in Delhi’s upscale Khan Market is opening a floor dedicated entirely to children’s books later this month.

Ghose’s stories engage the young reader in a tone descriptive of the city’s flavours, but not condescending or preachy, and come complete with paintings of colourful bazaars, kings, animals and tombs. “I wrote the way I always write, irrespective of whether the book is being targeted towards children or adults," says Ghose, who works as head of programmes at the India International Centre, New Delhi. Her slim volume showcases Delhi as experienced by animals and birds, visiting the city from the forests of Ranthambore in Rajasthan. “Last year I’d made drawings on this theme for an exhibition. Later, I made up the stories around these images. I concentrated on what a tiger, a rabbit, a butterfly would think and say while loafing in Delhi."

Snapshots:An illustration from Toto and the Leopard in The Adventures of Toto the Auto.
Book 2 ;a double-spread from 366 Words in Kolkata
An illustration from Tales of Historic Delhi.

The second adventure, Toto and the Leopard (Rs80), was set in the Sanjay Gandhi National Park in Borivali, Mumbai. “I want to give children a flavour of our cities," says Ruta Vyas, the author.

The same company has also published Deepti Belliappa Ganapathy’s 366 Words in Bengaluru (Rs125). In 40 pages, the colourful book gives children a sense of the city—and they also end up learning new words. Kolkata, Mumbai and Delhi are also covered in the 366 Words... series.

There is no success formula for children’s writing, though, and there’s no guarantee that a book on, say, Chennai, will find buyers beyond that city. Ravishankar admits that Tandon’s book did better in Mumbai than in other cities. “It’s impossible to guess what children would like to read because each child is different," she says. “Children are as different from each other as adults are, and we’d never presume to know what all adults like."

But children in Delhi at least seem to be taking to Ghose’s guide on the Capital. Last month more than 25 copies of her book were sold within a week at Jor Bagh’s The Book Shop. “The book is well illustrated and mostly it is the parents who are buying it for their kids," says K.D. Singh, the store owner. Narisetti’s Urban Crayon also did extremely well in this bookshop. “It was distributed to us by Prakash Books and we sold all the 30 copies. Unfortunately the publishers didn’t come out with a second print," says Singh.

Meanwhile, Toto is coming to Delhi this month. His next adventure, Manku’s Escape, will start at India Gate.

mayank.s@livemint.com

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Published: 26 Aug 2011, 10:25 PM IST
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