Teen Writers Bloc

The Writing for Children MFA experience at The New School — gulp, I can’t believe it’s over — was one of the most enriching educational experiences of my life. Here’s my attempt at capturing it in an ABCDErium with pros, cons and random essentials.

Authors. Meet them, read them, learn from them, learn with them, learn how to be one.

Amazing classmates. I really lucked out with this batch. Cheers class of 2012, you rocked!

ABCDErium. (ABBA-SEE-DA-REE-YUM) An A to Z perspective on a topic that you write after you meditate on it for a while and then just let it free-flow as you unleash your thoughts. An assignment for class I taught was to write an ABCDErium on Miles Davis’ album Bitches Brew. See Juggling.

Books. The MFA was a great way to learn things I never knew and needed to know about the business of books. I saw many of my classmates land book deals during the program. I also read more books in the last two years than I ever had—sometimes more than three books a week. At any point of the program my desk was covered in more than 15 books. Bliss!

Craft. Gathered immense respect for the craft of writing and the gazillion things that make it what it is: Thoughts. Plots. Words. Story arc. Character sketches. Voice. First person. Second person. Third person. Sub plots. Themes. Motifs. Summaries. Outlines. Revisions. Chapters. Buttons. Grammar. Edits. Rewrites. Writing is a beautiful complex organic stimulating scientific thing. As Andrea Davis Pinkney says: Writers Write.

Community of writers. Perhaps the best part of the MFA (at least for me) was the opportunity to share and learn with many inspiring and talented writers and build life-long associations with them.

Deadlines. The four scariest words for a writer — “I have a deadline.” And the only ones that get the job done. I doubt I’d be able to churn out my writing without deadlines — a journalism that trait stuck on. But as the MFA progressed, I feel like I coped with managing deadlines better. (I confess, this post was turned in late, but hey, I’m working on getting better at TWB deadlines.)

David Levithan. Taught us a seminar on teen lit in the first semester. Knows the YA and teen lit genre like the back of his hand and teaches a mad inspiring class about it. He is also very funny.

Expensive. Unless you have benefits, be prepared to be over $60K in debt. A part scholarship doesn’t even begin to count.

Focus. A writing degree with a focus on Writing for Children. As of now, few universities around the world  (seven to be precise) offer such a niche master’s creative writing program.

Feed. A dystopian novel by MT Anderson, one of my favorites from the reading list in the first semester. I loved the fact that the books on our syllabus were contemporary and uber cool.

Go For It. If you can afford it and are even thinking about a creative writing MFA, Go For It. It’s a great way to get started on writing projects that you’ve imagined for years but never gotten around to completing. Who knows, you might finally write that winning manuscript—or at least get started on it.

Harry Potter was not on our syllabus. Nor The Hunger Games. A lot of books you’d expect to see on a syllabus for a Writing for Children program weren’t on ours. In fact, the reading list for the Writing for Children concentration, with David Levithan and Susan Van Metre’s class (the only two classes that focus on children’s literature and were both fantastic) put together didn’t go beyond 30 books in the genre. Sure, we studied a LOT of excellent books, and yes, I definitely read tons outside of the syllabus as my own self-study. But I do feel like the program could use a more comprehensive and extensive reading list, and certainly one with more cultural diversity. Besides Sherman Alexie, Coe Booth and Grace Lin, I found the reading list dominated by white American authors. I don’t recall reading anything by a single Indian author. Perhaps the only Indian character I encountered was Bibi, a Bengali nanny from Julie Sternberg’s Like Pickle Juice on a Cookie.

Immersed. I feel like someone drowned me in a bottomless, delicious tub of kidlit.

Juggling. You could choose to focus solely on your writing, like some of my classmates. Or you could be adventurous and juggle real life (a time-consuming job) and write when no one’s looking, like others. Either way, writing requires some serious juggling skills that an MFA is sure to hone. In the first year I juggled with adjusting to life in a new country, as well as coping with a new system of education. I’d never left home before, so that was all pretty overwhelming, along with learning how to write academic papers, something I hadn’t formally learnt during my schooling in India. In the second year I was offered a Teaching Assistant position with New School’s Riggio Honors Program in Writing & Democracy, which was a fantastic opportunity for personal growth and learning. In Fall 2011 I assisted the amazing Tom Healy with his class The Writer’s Playlist, a close-listening and reading seminar that explores links between music and literature, both of which I’m passionate about. (That’s also where I discovered what an ABCDErium is). In Spring 2012 I joined the editorial team at 12^th Street, New School’s award-winning literary journal, where I had the opportunity to work with a dedicated team of student editors and contributors as we assembled the fifth issue of the magazine, from editing to production, publicity and beyond. Both my TA experiences invaluably broadened my reading range and literary network. Word.

Knowledge. It’s the foundation of the MFA, isn’t it?

Kevin Joinville. My buddy and the only boy in our class. The Writing for Children concentration usually has just the token male. This is not a pro or a con, just a mere observation.

Lang Café. Spent a lot of time inside it with peer group. Or by myself in the courtyard next to it staring into trees for inspiration and, yes, eavesdropping on conversations.

Manuscript. What a beautiful word! Say it with me: MAA-NUU-SCRIPT. By the time you graduate with an MFA, you might have one. Or two. Or three! Or you might have the semblance of a manuscript. Whatever the case, it’s a great feeling (I want to say accomplishment) to see a word document grow page by page into a large body of work. I wrote a little over ten pages of a story in the third semester that eventually became the major chunk of my creative thesis. And towards the end of thesis semester, my MAA-NUU-SCRIPT looked like this:

New York. Concrete jungle where dreams are made, yo.

New School. I’m proud to call it my writing Alma Mater. I had six other schools to pick from, and the New School was always numero uno on my list. I’m pretty convinced I made the right decision. Too many reasons. New School’s history of writers, which I was totally unaware of until recently, all the people I met during my time there, the fact that New York city is the helm of publishing and watering hole for aspiring writers, my amazing classmates. Let’s just say that the New School was an important and exciting chapter in the life of Riddhi Kamal Parekh.

Overwhelming. See New School.

Others. Writers of other genres. Like them Poets. Or writers of Fiction and NonFiction. Writers completely unlike those who Write for Children. There’s really minimal interaction amongst the WFC people and the other streams. My classmates may disagree, but I wish there was more mingling amongst the genres. Because, I mean, in real life, a writer is a writer is a writer, right? Also, how else would we have met the one and only Lenea Grace?

Peer group. In the fourth and final semester you suddenly find yourself rid of weekly classes and seminars. Instead, you meet with a peer group — a small group of classmates who read your work and give you feedback on it, and you do the same for theirs. My peer group felt balanced, committed and extremely inspiring, making the MFA worth every precious dollar. Amy Ewing, Caela Carter, Jess Verdi, Mary G. Thompson. You girls are my supportive upper lip.

Picture books. A largely ignored aspect of the Writing for Children program at The New School. Because of my interest in the genre, for some reason I had imagined there would be a larger focus on picture books. Perhaps the chance to collaborate with students from Parsons or something. But no such luck. My classmates even raised this issue with the faculty and tried to gain access to Children’s Book Illustration taught by Jacquie Hann, offered by The New School’s Continuing Education Program. This class might have been more beneficial than having to take a class outside of the Writing for children concentration (see Mary’s post for this month on this issue), but due to logistics or something, none of us were offered this class. We did, however, have a series of fantastic weekend workshops towards the end of each semester. One of them was in Picture Books, by the lovely Sarah Ketchersid, and I hope she continues conducting them at The New School. Andrea Davis Pinkney’s weekend workshop in Writing Cross-Culturally was also MUCH needed. Hats off to Dhonielle Clayton for arranging that. Like picture books, Cultural Diversity in Children’s and Teen Literature is another scarce aspect of the program. I’m sure everyone who attended these workshops will agree that they need to be further integrated into the overall curriculum of the Writing for Children program.

Questions. There are many swirling in my mind. Like was the MFA worth it? What happens next with my career? Will I find a job in publishing? Is it the MBA equivalent of Writing? What kind of jobs does one look for after an MFA im Creative Writing? Does it qualify you to teach? Will I ever sell my manuscript? Will I get an agent? Will I be the next JK Rowling? Who knows? Keep checking this blog for updates.

Quiet. There’s nothing as inspiring as a humorous ditty about writing a thesis or some ridiculous Hinglish Bollywood song  to get me recharged and get the words flowing again. But really, I do prefer silence when I’m writing—something I discovered through the course of this program. And yes, most people who are not writers, like roommates or friends who do ‘normal’ banking stuff or members of family may imagine that creative writing is a recreational and enjoyable activity where writers get high and turn on music and snap into the creative zone where writing page after page is just so easy. But really, no. Peace and quiet. Very essential to the process. (Oh bite me, you know Q is hard. But X is the hardest!).

Reading your work aloud. Yes, you have to do it in front of everyone at the end of your thesis semester. A few weeks ago, I read from my work at an MFA Student reading at Lang Center at The New School. It was the last student reading of our graduate program, where selected faculty and first and second year MFAers from all streams — Fiction, Poetry, NonFiction and Writing for Children — read from their work for about 3 to 4 minutes. Newly admitted students of Fall 2012 were invited to come and watch. Standing at the lectern, I zipped down nostalgia express to the first time I was in that very space at Lang Center. I was part of the audience — the sea of writers at the MFA orientation. I can still remember that feeling of being lost, as we called out our concentrations, and felt a little hope when I heard others call out the WFC concentration — although most said poetry or fiction. Back then, I never imagined I’d have anything to read to a room full of people, let alone be proud of it. If you chose to avail it, the monthly student readings at the New School great chance to the develop the confidence to read your work and to hear your peers and were a super supportive environment for me.

Submission. See Deadlines.

TWB. Teen Writers Bloc. This blog is a result of the MFA program class of 2012. And isn’t it the best thing ever? Three cheers to TWB! I’m proud to be a part of it.

Thesis semester. See Manuscript, Peer group.

Urban dictionary. A great resource for writing-related research. No, seriously.

Uneconomical. Can you learn the things you learn in an MFA program outside it? Sure you can. But will you take the time out to commit to your writing? And then will it be worth it? It’s a call every aspiring MFA candidate must to take. See Expensive, Overwhelming.

Voice. Very important when writing for children, teens, young adults and first-person narratives. David Levithan’s reading list introduced us to some fantastic voices. See David Levithan.

Vermont College of Fine Arts offers a low-residency MFA Program in Writing for Children & Young Adults. MT Anderson is part of the faculty. I’d love to hear more about it and compare the two programs. See Focus.

Writing for children. Gah. Pretty much the subject of this ABCDErium, no? See Go For It.

Xenophile. A deadly word I discovered in a desperate attempt to complete this post. Like the remarkable Dhonielle Clayton and myself, a xenophile is an individual who is attracted to foreign peoples, manners, or cultures. (Give me a break, you know X is the hardest!) See Quiet.

YA. I wasn’t as aware how extensive this literary genre was before I embarked to this program. Maybe it’s bigger in America? I’m not sure. Either way, YA rocks. (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_adult_literature) See David Levithan.

Zipped by. Whooooosh. It really did. I wish it didn’t pause for three months during the summer.

Photo Credit: Riddhi Parekh

Popularity: 1%

If you asked me today whether I would do The New School’s Writing for Children program over again, my answer would be an unequivocal yes. Thanks to the program, I’m now part of an amazing community of writers that I know I’ll be part of for the rest of my life. I’ve completed four novels, and my writing has improved immensely. Though I had already sold my first book by the time I started the program, I think that my MFA experience has greatly enhanced my lifetime career prospects.

So if you asked me whether you should do the New School MFA, I’d say yes, right? Well, not so fast. You see, the reason that my experience here has been so fantastic is my peer group — the twelve fantastic writers I’ve had the honor of working with over the last two years. Over the last two years, we’ve pushed each other and supported each other so that each of us has reached greater heights than we ever would have without the group. Though we had three talented writers for workshop instructors, it was the comments of our peers that we most trusted, and it was our peers’ writing that we most learned from. The New School provided the structure for the thirteen of us to come together. But what else did The New School provide? What would the program have been like if it were just the program, and my classmates had been different? This question has left me wondering whether the program will be as amazing for others as it was for me.

For anyone considering whether to do the MFA, this is what The New School Writing for Children program consists of: Two literature seminars taught by fantastic New York editors, three peer-driven workshop classes led by talented authors, and a thesis advisor. That sounds good, but it doesn’t exactly add up to two full years of instruction, worth two full years of tuition. The school offers three semesters during which MFA students take classes. For one of those semesters, Writing for Children students (but not Fiction or Poetry students) must take a literature seminar outside their genre. When some of us complained about the lack of a third Writing for Children seminar, the administration presented it as both an issue of lack of funding for the missing class and as a good thing for us, because Writing for Children students need exposure to other genres to become well-rounded writers. If the out-of-genre requirement had applied to all genres, I would have been okay with this and possibly even supportive, but as it was, I found it insulting. The insult was compounded by the fact that not one of the fiction seminars we ended up taking included a single YA book on the reading list. I’m guessing that everyone reading this blog agrees that YA literature is, in fact, real literature and that YA writers are, in fact, real writers. Plus, I’ve already ranted on this blog about how unhelpful I found my literature seminar to be. Suffice to say that I didn’t feel that our tuition money was wisely spent on our out-of-genre requirement.

And now we come to the fourth semester. During the fourth semester, MFA students take no classes whatsoever. We meet with peer groups and work with a thesis advisor on a creative thesis. The New School requires a “literature project,” but Writing for Children students typically use a paper that we write in David Levithan’s first semester literature seminar to fulfill that requirement. So the school demands full tuition simply for advising on the creative thesis. Don’t get me wrong, I loved working with my fabulous thesis advisor, Susan Van Metre! But I know the school isn’t paying her my full tuition. So I think the fourth semester is a rip-off.

Finally, there’s the problem of low expectations. If you wanted to, you could graduate from the program without ever having completed a novel. The thesis requirement is only fifty pages. You could literally write only fifty pages in the entire program and still graduate.

What does this mean? Basically, I think the program is a crap shoot. If you get lucky and end up with a fantastic class, then the program will be well worth it. But if you get unlucky, and you end up in a class that’s less cohesive and motivated, then the program may not be worth the money. Personally, I chose to come to the program because I wanted to make being a children’s author my lifelong career. But if I hadn’t been able to attend the program for whatever reason, I would still be writing. I would even still be celebrating the release of my first book (Wuftoom, on shelves May 8!) I suspect that many of my classmates would also still be writing and still have achieved at least some of their successes. The program enhanced our careers, but it didn’t write our books for us. Success in the program requires a fire from within, something no amount of money can buy you.

Image credit: The Fabulous Riddhi Parekh!

Popularity: 11%

A few weeks ago, I smacked my laptop shut and said, “That’s it. I don’t want to write anymore. It’s too hard.”

I was fed up with the insurmountable task of putting words to a blank page. I had some concepts in mind, but after chalking them out, I pitied the fool that might have to read them.

And sadly, that fool was me.

I gave up trying to “create” and decided, instead, to polish another story — one I’d been keeping a safe distance from. I had been “building” on it for a year now, but every time I tried to plough through, I seemed to get stuck.

Perhaps I should have outlined it better. What is really going on here? Why have I cooked up this messy stew that I’m too afraid to sip on? I can’t see the path ahead. It’s too hard. Help! Help!

Or perhaps I was too attached. I couldn’t seem to chop evidently extraneous characters and scenes. Who should I keep? Who should I cut? Help! Help!

Once again, I smacked the laptop shut and gave up.

I told myself this would all be over soon, and that after the MFA, I’d never ever write ever again. I backspaced and deleted 40 pages of that tale. I dug a deep trench and buried myself in that cold, dank and dark space where there was no pressure to write. No need to create. No words or pages. Just space to imagine it perfectly in my head.

I told my classmates about how I was DONE with writing.

Dhonielle told me to get out of that hole.

Lenea gave it to me straight up and said, “You’re being fickle.”

They were both right.

A lot goes on in the mind of a writer. As Jess pointed out at our last peer group meeting, sometimes you can imagine a conversation that your characters are having and it occupies at least a whole page — in your head. But when you sit down and actually write that dialogue, it’s difficult to stretch it beyond a paragraph or two.

This semester, I discovered that, often the parts of my writing that I almost cut out or was too embarrassed to share were the ones I got most compliments for.

But for me, there is always fear. The fear of being judged. And the fear is a bad habit. One that can easily stop you from going farther with your writing. What are people going to think of me? Is this lame?

A writer once told me that he’d rather be walking down Sixth Avenue naked with the whole world staring at him than have people read his poetry. I concur.

As writers, we place too much of a burden on ourselves, trying to sift through our billions of thoughts and stringing them into sentences and paragraphs to make the text perfect. And when we reread our work and share it with others, it is as if our writing is the metaphorical dead frog about to be dissected.

More so for everyone at Teen Writers Bloc, because we have a few weeks in hand to write that masterpiece of a thesis.

So for now, the one bad habit I’d like to “cleanse” myself of is the fickle-minded one. The one that plagues me with fear. The one that makes me overthink it.

I am my own worst enemy. I must bid adieu to that scary, imagined audience. I will no longer allow you to run up my laptop-repair costs. I will write and rewrite and write some more, unafraid. And the text shall remain on the screen.

Speech Bubbles image courtesy http://www.freedigitalphotos.net

Popularity: 11%

It’s always hard picking favorites. But not for me, especially when it comes to women authors. I’ve said it before on this blog and I’ll say it over and over again. I love Paro Anand. She is hands-down my favorite groundbreaking female author writing today.

This doesn’t mean that I haven’t been inspired by other wonderful and talented women authors like Judy Blume, Enid Blyton, Agatha Christie, Jhumpha Lahiri, Alice Walker, Coe Booth, Gertrude Stein, Laurie Halse Anderson and Cornelia Funke. But here’s a few reasons why Paro Anand makes it to the top of my list:

1. Her stories are set in India, but reflect the voices of children who could be from anywhere in the world. She captures the voice of a child beautifully, whether it’s a kid whose parents are going through a messy divorce or someone who is cheating at a test. She’s very versatile in her writing — as boys and girls and even animals and angels, of all ages and sizes. She even has a book called Elephants Don’t Diet, about Gol Matolu, an elephant that thinks she is too fat.

2. She’s funny. That’s a superpower in itself. Her book Wingless, about Chutki, an angel who is banished from heaven because she is born without wings, is my go-to book for whenever I’m feeling down. It always manages to get a laugh out of me. Especially, the line “That perhaps, this was the shape of wings to come.”

3. She’s serious where seriousness is called for. Her books Weed and No Guns At My Son’s Funeral are set in the region of war-torn Kashmir. The protagonists of both of these novels are young boys dealing with terrorism at a dangerously close range. She makes it all very real, the loss of innocence, the threat of militancy, the loss of life, themes such as these are handled sensitively and I would recommend this text to a classroom of students.

4. She literally can’t stop writing. She has authored more than 18 books for children and young adults, including plays, short stories, novellas and novels. She is published in several anthologies and has written extensively on children’s literature in India. She headed the National Centre for Children’s Literature, The National Book Trust, India, the apex body for children’s literature in India. She has been instrumental in setting up libraries and Readers’ Clubs in rural India and conducting training programs on the use of literature. She’s also a World Record Holder, for helping over 3000 children make the World’s Longest Newspaper (850 meters long) in 11 Indian states in 13 languages. The concept behind the project was to give a voice to those children who do not have a platform and to empower young people to create their own literature.

5. Paro still keeps in touch. I had the chance to meet her a few years ago and interviewed her. I bugged her with some questions last night, and guess what? She replied! Here’s what she said:

RP: Are you working on anything at the moment? Written anything new lately?

PA: Yes, I have just started a new novel – also about women, for groan ups and about hitting middle age. It’s in the very early stages write now. Also going to be working side by side on a non-fiction work called Literature in Action that basically covers the kind of work I’ve been doing with young people through stories all these years. My latest offering for YA is a collection of my stories from Penguin called Wild Child.

RP: Do you have a writer’s routine?

PA: I try and write at least two hours a day. It’s a goal I like to fulfill as I just love that time. It does not always work out, but I then try to make up that time on another day. I grab that time any time I can. Whether it’s sitting in the sun, amongst flowers, or sitting in a traffic jam and being driven to my destination.

RP: What are you reading these days?

PA: I’m just finishing Our Lady of Alice Bhatti by Mohammed Hanif and will then start The Palace of Illusions by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni. As for YA, I’m looking forward to starting The Truth About Celia Frost by Paula Rawsthrone. Ranjit Lal’s book Faces in the Water was an awesome read, as was Sidhartha Sarma’s Grasshopper’s Run. I also recently read The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.

RP: Who are some of your favorite authors? Do you have any go-to books that you go to when you’re feeling less inspired?

PA: I love Chimamanda Adichie and Murakami because they are so contemporary but also have a voice that is so much their own and from their roots. I love reading young adult fiction.

RP: What do you do when you feel like you can’t write anything beyond what you have written?

PA: I shudder to think of that possibility, but as you know, you can’t shut me up. I always have a lot to say. I think I find stories in everyday things and not in some mammoth saga, so I think there’s always that. I don’t want to sound grand by saying ‘life is my inspiration,’ but it actually is. There was a time last year which was the longest I wasn’t writing anything at all, and I’d give in to panic. But somewhere, I knew that there was more junk in there to get out.

RP: How do you spend your time when you’re not writing?

PA: I garden. I have a large, loving involving family. I love watching TV (I’m a great couch potato), I travel, I talk on the phone. I mean I am NEVER bored, don’t know what that’s like. I always wish I had more time. And when I want to switch off, I play Spider Solitaire on my laptop.

Photo courtesy Riddhi Parekh

 

Popularity: 10%

Last week, I picked out two books from the middle-grade fiction shelf at Mulhenburg, my corner NYLP. I hadn’t specifically sought them out, but was amazed at one random but major coincidence: Grk Smells a Rat (by Joshua Doder) and Small Acts of Amazing Courage (by Gloria Whelan) both have connections to India. Neither book is by an Indian author and both are of completely different genres.

I’ve only briefly thumbed through Whelan’s book and the jacket tells me that it is about Rosalind, an English girl in India in 1918. The first Indian character to be mentioned in the book is Ranjit, and imagine my surprise — NOT — to discover that he is the head servant.

Grk…,with an illustration of the Taj Mahal on its cover (although it was the spine that caught my attention and that doesn’t even feature the Taj on it), tells the hilariously-funny adventure of the British tourists Tim, Max, Natascha and their dog Grk as they arrive in New Delhi for the Vijay Ghat International Lawn Tennis Association Under-Sixteen Championship. I read this book cover to cover. It was delicious, and I devoured every page.

My heart jumped with joy when I read about Mr. Vijay Ghat: “Vijay Ghat was one of the richest men in India. He had made millions and millions and millions gambling on the stock market. He’d made millions of dollars, yen and euros too.” Finally, an Indian that isn’t a beggar or a doctor, nor a slumdog millionaire, I exclaimed. But perhaps too soon. The kids also meet Krishnan, a boy who sells them a pirated copy of Harry Potter and belongs to the Blue Rat Gang, a group that enslaves children.

As I mentioned earlier, I thoroughly enjoyed the entire novel, but couldn’t help roll my eyes at some of the stuff captured in it — like the Blue Rat Gang. I questioned if it was cool for the author to spin a yarn about a woman who controlled thousands of children by listening to a talking rat. Did he set it in India simply because mine is a culture full of exotic things like elephant-headed gods? Is that supposed to make it believable? Perhaps not.

But then I had a long, hard think about my own writing and took back all the eye-rolls. I’ve never intentionally intended to or set out writing about Indianness as an agenda. One of my stories is about a girl caught in a punctuation war, while another is about a man and his runaway moustache. Both stories are set in India, and that is certainly NOT why they are (I hope) ridiculous. I wasn’t ever trying to milk my ‘exoticism’: in my defense, the stories unbelievability exists due to its fictionability.

But the Indianness is inescapable. My background and my culture bleeds into my writing in a way in which I have no control. Heck, I even have a character in one of my stories who is a kid from the slums. But that said, in a large portion of my work, I’m certainly NOT painting an accurate and believable picture of India myself. Isn’t it great that fiction allows us to create worlds that are familiar to ours, and yet very different? And if I can let myself get away with it, I must allow other writers to do the same.

Writing about ethnicity is always a sensitive issue. When people from one ethnicity or culture write about people from other cultures, there’s always the chance of someone being offended (this may include even those who share the same ethnicity as the author). It makes it worse when people lose their sense of humor and imagination. Often, people get offended by things that may be completely unintentional. I’m pretty sure the authors weren’t suggesting that all of India is full of illiterate con artists, servants and beggars that are controlled by talking rats, but maybe for a split-second the thought couldn’t help but cross my mind. Still, taking offence would only make me the ignorant one.

Before I came to New York, I had been warned about ignorant “white” people who would ask me if people back home really lived in trees and travelled on the backs of elephants. But I’m very proud to be in a city and in a school where I pretty sure I will never meet that “white person.” I don’t feel the need to explain the way things are back home (or to remind people that they’re not that different), because frankly, us Indians are inescapable. We’re just too many of us, and we’re everywhere.

Some of my classmates are always asking me for more Indian details in my writing, they want to see everything, smell everything, taste everything and touch every little thing, just to get a sense of how real it is. I hope I can give them a blend of what they want, while balancing out the fictional world that I am trying to create. In the meanwhile, I’m hoping to see books by great contemporary Indian authors such as Paro Anand, Kalpish Ratna, Anshumani Ruddra and Sampurna Chattarji on bookshelves here in NYC.

Popularity: 8%

I often feel like I made a really bad decision with my literature class. At first I thought I’d be interested in the reading list, but after going through a lot of really dense and difficult texts like Tristram Shandy, Ryder, Pale Fire, Naked Lunch and Hopscotch, I wish I’d taken a class that involved some lighter reading.

Luckily, I was also working on a new story for our children’s writing seminar and drew inspiration from some really awesome picture books that I randomly picked them out at the New York Public Library. I was delighted that they were light and funny – just the thing to balance those pretentious fiction texts that were weighing me down.

Here’s a few of the ones that really rocked.

The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein

This one is so simple and charming, a story about a boy and a tree that gives the boy whatever he wants. I had never actually read this as a picture book, only as an email, which sucks because I was missing out on seeing the real Tree. And what a wonderful tree it is!

The Gift by Carol Ann Duffy and Rob Ryan

A very subtle story about a little girl who wanders off from a woodland picnic and finds herself in a lovely clearing and meets an old woman who grants her wish in exchange for a simple necklace of flowers. Remarkably intricate floral details in a folk-art style with hand cut illustrations.

The Bear That Wasn’t by Frank Tashlin

I may have written about this book before, but it’s become like home to me. It’s a bittersweet story about a hibernating bear that awakens to find himself in the middle of a factory where everyone he meets insists that he’s not a bear, but a silly man who needs a shave and wears a fur coat. What’s great about it is the way it tells you to be proud of who you are in a humorous, non-preachy manner.

Someone Used My Toothbrush and Other Bathroom Poems by Carol Diggory Shields and Paul Meisel

Breaking away from the nature them, I moved to the bathroom, with a book featuring lots of different families in hilarious poems with clever word play and just the right amount of grossness about potty training, cleaning the bathroom, waiting in line, an over-crowded medicine cabinet and so on.

BrainJuice: English, Fresh Squeezed!  by Carol Diggory Shields and Tony Ross

More poems by the same author who gave us bathroom poems, this one was just the thing for the grammar nerd in me. This one simplifies the English language, giving you a hilariously honest lowdown on punctuation, spelling, diagramming sentences, drafting letters, writing poetry and much more.

The Terrible Plop by Ursula Dubosarsky and Andrew Joyner

This one reminded me of the Chicken Little and the Sky Is Falling story. Only, in this case, it starts with the rabbits, who hear a terrible plop and begin to run through the forest spreading mass panic about something terrible that’s going to happen. I bet kids will love repeating the “PLOP” as it recurs on every page — and maybe they’ll be able to deal with their own fears through this adorably illustrated book.

Digital Imaging: Riddhi Parekh

Popularity: 11%

Fanny turned on the flashlight. Now she could just barely see the steps. Why had she volunteered to do this? Hannah and Jenny’s laughter spilled into the tiny den behind her. Wimps. It was Jenny’s own house, and she couldn’t even come into the same room as the basement door. Jenny’s whole family was crazy. Imagine being too scared to even change a light bulb in your own basement. As if there could be anything but a few mice down here. Not that Fanny wanted to see mice. Ugh.

She started slowly down the steps. The flashlight flickered. Had it gotten dimmer? It didn’t matter anyway. All she had to do to prove they were all morons was go down, take one look around, and come back up. She quickened her pace, and soon she was almost at the bottom.

“Fanny?” Hannah’s voice came from above.

“I can’t! I’ll stay here!” said Jenny, in an exaggerated whisper.

Fanny rolled her eyes. “I’m so fine. There’s nothing down here!”

Crack. Her foot crunched through the bottom step. “Aaaah!” Fanny screamed out of surprise, grabbing for anything to hang on to. She landed in an incredibly awkward position, with her left leg twisted behind her. Three-quarters of her right leg was stuck inside the step. How was that possible? She was already at the bottom. “Hannah! One of the stairs broke. Get down here and help me!”

There was no response.

“Hannah?”

Fanny listened for her friends’ voices. “Jenny?”

Silence. No one came down the stairs. No one answered her shouts. She pulled her leg from the broken step. Miraculously, there wasn’t a bruise or a cut or a scratch. She picked up her flashlight and flashed it around the room. The light beam caught dark heaps of unrecognizable objects and rows and rows of old junk on shelves. Cobwebs danced along the walls, leaping from corner to corner. She pointed her light at the ceiling, searching for the fixture. She wanted to change the light bulb and get back upstairs as fast as possible.

She imagined the look on their faces when she triumphantly returned. She’d call Jenny a chicken just to see her pout, and she’d tease Hannah about being a wimp just to make her cheeks redden. Fanny stepped further into the cellar basement.

She wasn’t afraid.

The scurry of tiny feet echoed around her. Mice! Fanny scrambled backwards onto the broken staircase. Little red eyes peered at her in the darkness. They came closer and closer until they clustered all around her feet.

“Go away!” She wiggled her flashlight at them. “Shoo!”

The mice paid her no attention. Instead, they bypassed her and ventured into the hole her foot had left in the wooden staircase. She scooted further away, pulling her legs into her chest with the hope that they wouldn’t touch her. One by one, a train of little black mice scurried into the opening. After the last tail disappeared, she stuck her light into the hole. Small round bodies ambled down another staircase.

“Hannah? Jenny?” Fanny yelled. “There’s a …” Fanny’s words lodged in her throat. She didn’t quite know what she was looking at. How could another staircase be underneath Jenny’s cellar? A cool breeze made its way through the opening. Fanny ripped away more of the floorboards. The stubborn wood creaked as she yanked it. After removing two complete stairs, she could see down into the hole. A subtle glow akin to moonlight washed over the bottom of the mysterious stairs.

The mice reached the bottom. They all turned to look back up at her.

Come! they said in unison.

Their mouths didn’t move. Rather, the word rang as clear as a bell inside Fanny’s head. She’d never experienced anything like it before, and she shrieked and stumbled back at the shock of it.

Come, Fanny, the mice said again.

Fanny righted herself and stared through the opening, down at the creatures. As her gaze met those beady red eyes, she felt a calm wash over her. Gone was the fear of the basement, of the darkness, of the mice. All she could think to say, as she felt that cool air and strange light brush over her skin, was, “How do you know my name?”

We’ve been waiting for you, they said.

Though not exactly an answer to her question, that was all the explanation Fanny needed. She rested her dull, useless flashlight on one of the undamaged steps and slid through the hole in one swift movement. The gap in the stair was just the right size for her body, and in one second flat she was descending the hidden staircase.

From above, the length of the staircase had been deceiving. Now that Fanny was walking down it, it felt like it was going on much longer than it should have. Down and down she traveled, and yet there were still more stairs in front of her. It was especially frustrating because with each step she took, the more she yearned to be at the bottom, amongst the mice and whatever else awaited her down there.

She couldn’t see much, other than the mice and the steps and the light, because there were tall walls on either side of her, blocking her view of what she would find at the foot of the stairs. On a whim, Fanny reached out and ran her hand along the wall. In the instant that her fingertips connected with the unremarkable gray cement, she felt a jolt go through her, as if every miniscule cell in her body had been given a shock with defibrillator paddles. It reminded Fanny of the time Hannah and Jenny had dared her to drink five Red Bulls in five minutes—only way better. She felt energized, and strong, and like she could do anything. She pulled her hand away from the wall and picked up her pace.

That boost of magical energy was exactly what she’d needed. Finally, Fanny reached the bottom of the stairs. The first thing she noticed was that, from her bare arms to her sandaled toes, her skin was glowing. The second thing she noticed was that there were a lot more mice down here than she’d originally thought. They were everywhere—tens of thousands of them, lined up in neat military-like rows, staring up at her expectantly.

The third thing she noticed was the room around her.

The floor wasn’t really a floor; nailed into the cement were rafters, like she’d seen on the ceiling of her own basement, or even Jenny’s. In fact, on closer look, it looked an awful lot like Jenny’s basement, if she crooked her head like she was upside-down. Right above her on the ceiling she saw steps, two broken in, like the ones she had just crawled into. Fanny tried to shine a beam on the rest of her surroundings, but as soon as she did this, the tiny bulb flickered out, leaving her in complete darkness. Oh no! The only sign of light now came from the crack under the door of the stairs on the ceiling.

The only thing she could see around her were the eyes of the mice. Cobwebs decorated the rafters, making the mice look like they were perched on clouds.

Fanny knelt down and peered into the eyes of one of the mice. No pupils. Just white. She found herself reaching for it, but the mouse sneered, his eyes glowed red and he went in for a bite. Instinctively, she fell backward and let out an ear-piercing screech. The angry mouse snapped back into line, its eyes falling white again.

“I need to get out of here,” Fanny said out loud. Her heart thumped and she thought the mice could hear it. She went to turn around, to leave, but found no exit. The long staircase she had descended had disappeared. “You’ve got to be kidding me?”

Suddenly, squeaking laughter from the thousands of mice echoed all around her. She looked down and saw that every last one of them was now pointing at the steps stemming upward from the ceiling.

“And how do you suppose I get up those stairs?” she asked. “Now, if this were a fairytale, or a portal into Wonderland, this would be the part where a little bottle would pop up and say ‘Drink Me’ and I’d drink it and suddenly have the ability to fly or something, right?” At this point, she figured she was dreaming. No, she definitely knew she was dreaming. She had to be, right? Maybe when I fell in Jenny’s basement I hit my head and was knocked unconscious, she thought.

Still, she looked around. No magic bottle. No magic beans to grow a beanstalk. Nothing. Well, except for the mice.

“Would you stop staring at me?!” she yelled, flinging her defunct flashlight into the flea-bitten crowd. Still, they didn’t break formation.

She threw her hands up in the air in frustration, only to notice her fingertips glowing. She remembered her skin glowing as she walked down the long cement staircase, but it quickly went away when she reached Jenny’s upside-down basement.

She turned her palms toward the ceiling, toward the staircase, and immediately felt lighter on her feet. Looking down, she noticed that she was, in fact, hovering over the ground. For a moment, she hesitated, but since she was certain she was dreaming, she figured she might as well go with it and reached for the wooden banister above her.

When her fingers grazed the wood, Fanny felt a pang in her stomach and everything around her flipped in one swift, uneven movement. She was flung toward the staircase, and when she looked up, the basement was right-side up again. She looked to see where the mice had gone, she found them still on the rafters, hanging upside down above her head like furry bats. Their white eyes stared down at her.

They watched her as she climbed the stairs back into Jenny’s house.

“Jenny?” Fanny called when she reached the top of the stairs. “Hannah?”

Goosebumps spread up and down her arms as an icy breeze froze her in place. She clambered up the basement staircase. She found herself shivering in Jenny’s once warm family room. Everything was just as she had left it. The sleeping bags in the middle of Jenny’s lush family room, the snacks scattered across the floor, even the movie Hocus Pocus was still paused at the exact same spot it was at when they dared her to go into that wretched basement.

Still, there was no sign of Jenny. Or Hannah.

A floorboard creaked above her. Oh, so they’re upstairs? They want me to be really scared now, huh? Fanny thought.

“It’s not going to work…!” Fanny yelled. Wait until they hear about what I’ve seen. The mice. The upside down staircase. The glowing hands and skin.

She huffed upstairs and checked every room, Jenny’s, her parents, the guest room, even her older brothers room that was always Off Limits. Nothing. No sign of anyone. Not even Jenny’s parents.

As she started downstairs, she heard what sounded like a body flopping on a tile floor. She raced down the stairs and into the kitchen. Nothing. They’re quick, Fanny thought, but not as quick as me. I’m the schools cross-country star, not Jenny, she’s way too fat to run. And Hannah, she’s not smart enough to think of all of this.

Fanny walked out the kitchen, thoroughly pissed off. “Hello? Umm, ok, not funny anymore guys. What started off like a page from Coraline became some cheesey opening scene from Scream 10. Over it,” she shouted.

As she reached the living room, she saw Hannah and Jenny standing with their backs toward her, watching the paused TV screen.

“There you are! Seriously? Where did you guys go? I have to say, you had me…” Fanny said, reaching for Hannah’s shoulder. Hannah didn’t respond. She tapped Jenny, but Jenny didn’t flinch; her body was hard as the cement wall she had felt earlier, and just as cold.

Fanny began to hear the pitter-patter of small feet scurrying around her. She looked behind her and saw the mice hopping on Jenny’s furniture. When they stopped, Fanny grabbed Jenny and whisked her around, hoping to get the attention of her friends.

That’s when she noticed Jenny’s face, her skin droopy and tarred, like it had been melting. Her lips were replaced by a zipper. Her eyes, stark white.

She reached for Hannah, who looked the same; the only difference was that Hannah had her fingers on the zipper that had been sloppily sewn onto her chapped, bleeding skin.

“Cut it out, girls,” she said, but it didn’t feel like a prank anymore. The lights flickered.

They both looked Fanny right in the eyes, and instead of speaking, let out little grunts, sounding like angry dogs. There was a sickening stench in the room, like fresh vomit and rotting flesh. Fanny couldn’t get her eyes off Jenny and Hannah. They looked so pale… so weird. She took a step back. Then she realized that the smell was actually coming from them. They reeked!

Their flesh was rotting. Little black shiny worms came crawling out of Jenny eyes. A fat gray maggot slid out of Hannah’s right nostril and began to glide across her face. Within seconds, a thousand red tubeworms were going up and down Jenny’s hands.

Fanny could feel beads of sweat collecting on her forehead. Then, she felt something run down her spine. It wasn’t just sweat. It felt like something with feet. Like a bug. She scratched her back, and felt something gooey and oozing.

When she looked at her finger, she found a dead fly where her forefinger should have been. She shook her palm, but the fly just wouldn’t fall. The lights flickered again. Fanny looked up to Jenny and Hannah had disappeared. In place of the television screen was a mirror.

And in place of her own reflection, Fanny could only see the fly. This couldn’t be real. She HAD to get out of the room.

She took another step back and bumped into something. Someone. She turned around to see Jenny’s mother, Mrs. Capelli. Only, she was much broader and larger than her usual petite self. And tinted blue?

“Stay for dinner, Fanny,” said Mrs. Capelli. Only, it didn’t sound like Mrs. Capelli. There was something hollow about that voice, like it was coming from the end of a long tube. That’s when Fanny noticed the gleaming blade of the giant knife in Mrs. Capelli’s left hand. Her white apron was stained with specks of brown. Blood. It had to be blood.

Mrs. Capelli began to walk across the room towards Fanny. “Did you meet our friends from the basement?” The lights flashed violently now. Mrs. Capelli got closer to Fanny. “They’re really quite lovely, aren’t they dear?”

Thud. Thud. Thud. The floor shook with each step.

Something gripped Fanny’s ankles. She found herself unable to move. She tried to lift her left leg, but it just wouldn’t budge. She looked down and freaked out.

Around each of her ankles was a wrist, one belonging to Jenny, and another one to Hannah. They were lying on the floor, on their sides, grunting and growling. Jenny began to gnaw at Fanny’s toe.

Fanny thrashed back and forth and screamed until she had no voice. Her head felt foggy and light. She heard her name.

“Fanny.”

Her heart threatened to stop.

“Fanny!”

Sweat soaked her cheeks.

“Fanny!!!”

Her skin itched. She was dying she was certain of it.

“Open your eyes!”

Fanny listened to the voice. Painfully, she opened her eyes. Both Hannah and Jenny stared at her. Jenny stifled a giggle, but Hannah’s face wore concern.

“You fell,” Hannah said.

“What?” Fanny croaked out.

“You tumbled down the stairs,” Jenny said with a laugh.

“Girls! What’s going on down there?” Mrs. Capelli stood at the top of the basement stairs.

“Fanny fell!” Jenny called back.

“Where are the mice? The staircase?” Fanny’s eyes darted around. “You were….you both were…”

“What?” they said in unison.

Fanny gazed around. Her head throbbed with pain. A knot formed on the back of her head. Each time she moved pain shot through her entire body. She was sprawled at the bottom of the step. “Nevermind.”

The girls helped Fanny to her feet. They started back up the stairs. Mrs. Capelli brought an ice-pack.

“Mom, I think Fanny broke one of the wooden stairs when she fell,” Jenny said.

Fanny gawked behind her. In the slit beneath the basement door, she swore she saw the red glow of tiny eyes in the darkness.

This story was written by Teen Writers Bloc members Mary Thompson, Dhonielle Clayton, Jess Verdi, Riddhi Parekh, and Steven Shaw, in a round. One person started the story and then passed it to another person to add, then that person picked up where the first person left off and added text, then sent it on. The story took on many dimensions. We hope you enjoyed it. 

Photo Credit: Clitheroe Paranormal Investigators

Popularity: 24%

I’ve lived in India for most of my life, where Halloween isn’t a national holiday or anything. While growing up, if I had the chance, I am certain I would have pestered my mom to make me an Edward Scissorhands costume—and she’d never have allowed it, or perhaps helped me make one using foil.

The only time I’ve worn a costume, other than for one costume party as a grown up, was for a ‘fancy dress competition’ in school, when I was about 12. I went as a magician and pulled a scarf out of thin air. Well, a tube, but it was a pretty clever trick, I even won a prize. I still remember the girl who won first place, she came dressed as a whole bloody pumpkin! And I will never forget the boy whose mother thought it would be okay to load him up with water and send him onstage as the Manneken Pis (literally Little Man Pee)—but that’s for another post altogether.

Anyway, if I could celebrate Halloween on a yearly basis, I think for me it would be all about the hat. The hat maketh the costume. The hat maketh the character. And besides, you can never go wrong with a hat.

There’s so many great literary characters who wore hats that I’d love to be:

1.     Like, good ole Witches, they’re never without em. If you’re in the mood for something easy (there’s nothing wrong with easy): flowing black skirt, messy hair, talcum powder on face and broom. You’re set.

2.     The Mad Hatter. Easy again, vest, scarves, teacup, nonsense talk, big hats, as many as possible.

3.     Dr. Suess’ The Cat in The Hat (who knows a lot about that)

4.     Captain Jack Sparrow (but that’s sooooo cliché)

5.     Willy Wonka

6.     A chef,

7.   A court jester

7.     Santa Claus

8.     Charlie Chaplin

Maybe it’s because I’m the kind of person who actually likes to wear many different hats, pardon the pun, or because hats are just so expressive. Anyway, on that note, I’d like to sign off with some images of me in different hats and wish all our readers a very Hatty Halloween!

Popularity: 19%

The only thing that should be banned is the word ban!

I was shocked to find many books that I recommend to my students at drama class on the list of the decade’s most banned books. Books like Are You There, God?  It’s Me, Margaret by Judy Blume, Goosebumps (series) by R.L. Stine, Tiger Eyes by Judy Blume, Junie B. Jones (series) by Barbara Park, Blubber by Judy Blume, The Color Purple by Alice Walker, Captain Underpants (series) by Dave Pilkey and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. These are books that I enjoyed reading as a child and certainly provided food for thought as I was growing up. I’m glad that in India, these books were readily available in libraries and nobody ever stopped me from reading them.

When I think about banned books, one of my favorite authors, Salman Rushdie immediately comes to mind. Rushdie’s fourth novel, The Satanic Verses was published in 1998 and less than a year later, it was banned. Rushdie’s style of fiction heavily incorporates magic realism, and while nothing in the text struck me as  “anti-Islam”, The Satanic Verses sparked a major controversy when Muslims accused it of blasphemy and mocking their faith. The outrage among some Muslims resulted in afatwā  or a death sentence issued against the author by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Supreme Leader of Iran, on February 14, 1989.

Now, it is one thing to have your book banned, but to receive a death sentence for it is, to have people across the world hunting you down for a reward, to put it mildly, ridiculous. While Khomeini died a year after the fatwa was issued, the death sentence was never revoked, because according to Islamic tradition, only the issuer of the fatwa can withdraw it.

The unnecessary attention that The Satanic Verses received led to Salman Rushdie spending almost eleven years of his life in hiding, separated from his family. Perhaps the only positive thing to come out of all of this, was his children’s book Haroun & The Sea of Stories, that he wrote chapter by chapter as a means of communicating with his son. Haroun & The Sea of Stories is cleverly written, many examples in the book refer to Rashid Khalifa, a storyteller, being unable to tell his stories.

According to me, banning books is completely pointless. There’s a real world out there, one that children and young adults are sure to make contact with sooner or later. No matter how much you try to shelter your child, reality always catches up. In my opinion, it is better to allow teens and younglings to read material that may be controversial, ask questions about it and comprehend it. The more you try to tell a child not to do something, the more they will want to do it.

Photo: The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie (book cover courtesy Viking, U.K. 1988)

Popularity: 16%

Summer is all about doing whatever you want. I never liked being forced to read, and luckily, because I like to read, I never had to be forced to read. Here’s a list of things I’ve been reading this summer (although in India it is actually the Monsoon). I’d gladly recommend these titles to anybody and everybody and have also explained why. But hey, no pressure…

The Spectacular Spectacle Man by Vishakha Chanchani; TARA Publishing

Because you need a different point of view!

Meet Chashmuddin Chashmewale, and you absolutely must, because there never was a groovier salesman of spectacles. In this neat picture book that opens out into one giant rectangle or folds back into 12 tiny ones — depending on how you look at it — the spectacular spectacle man makes a charming plea to customers to buy his awesome spectacles. I was sold simply on the artwork and the cellophane shades on the cover and more delighted to find that it is written entirely in verse and filled with wordplay and humorous puns. The many shades of this book bring out the qualities that Chashmuddin’s miraculous spectacles offer: from opening up a new green world for you, making all that is tragic vanish and making the thin look fat and the short look tall, you’ve got to have ‘em all. I especially loved the reminders that miracles follow wherever you go and life without spectacles is no life at all.

 

Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salman Rushdie; Penguin/GRANTA

Because summer is about journeys, the more magical, the better!

One of my all-time-favorites, if you still haven’t read this one, it is about time. A young boy named Haroun and his father, a story-teller named Rashid, also known as The Shah of Blah, go on an animated and adventurous journey to the Ocean of the Sea of Stories to find out why it is polluted. They meet many insane and entertaining characters like a water-genie, a talking hoopoe, a floating gardener and a pair of fish with mouths all over their bodies. Read this brilliantly hilarious book to understand why I’m cutting short the review. It’s a P2C2E, or a Processes Too Complicated to Explain.

The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole by Sue Townsend;  Puffin

Let’s face it, because you can’t get enough of reading someone else’s diary!

Recommended by our poet classmate Lenea Grace, this is a must-read for those of you who like it when you laugh so hard that your belly hurts. Written as a series of excruciatingly personal journal entries or in the secret diary format, Adrian Mole explains why growing up can be such a pain. Especially if you have a family as dysfunctional as Adrian’s. And really, who doesn’t? Adrian is fifteen and struggling to be noticed as an intellectual. His mother, who is fifty, is having a baby and his father’s trying to lie about a vasectomy. Adrian’s whole world seems to be falling apart. Could things get worse? Of course they do. After all, Adrian is getting spotty and is madly in love with Pandora. This tongue-in-cheek satire is the second title from the Adrian Mole series and a great travel companion.

 

The Giggler Treatment by Roddy Doyle; Scholastic

Because nothing’s as sweet as nasty revenge!

As one reviewer on Amazon put it, this book is an “Awesome adventure of a shoe and a poo and how the two meet.” From the ingeniously funny chapter titles like “Chapter two million and seven” and “This chapter is named after my fridge because it keeps all my food fresh: Chapter FRIDGE” to revelations like “Dogs don’t like going to the toilet on the street. But their owners make them do it,” Roddy Doyle tells us a story about the gigglers: little furry creatures who serve justice to children that have been wronged by adults by placing a pile of dog poo right in front of the adult to step on. Fun. Fun. Fun.

 

The Boy with the Magic Numbers by Sally Gardner;  Dolphin

Because a little magic can go a long way!

In this easy-flowing narrative, Sally Gardner tells us about little Billy Pickles whose dad suddenly leaves home. A funny shaped moneybox, a trip to New York City, luck with numbers, a kidnapping mystery and a taste of fame make this a charming, well-paced read. Gardner easily slips in and out of the adventure to tell us how Billy is feeling, especially when Billy meets his grandmother, Mighty Mamma, and his father’s new girlfriend, Trixie, for the first time.

 

The Monstrous Memoirs of a Mighty McFearless by Ahmet Zappa; Puffin

Because you need the recipe for SOAP SCUM SPRAY SERUM!

Minerva and Max McFearless have just discovered that they are descended from a long line of monster-hunters. Their father has been kidnapped by the king of evil himself, Zarmaglog, and they’ve got to be fearless and rescue him. But it isn’t going to be easy. As the cover warns you: “The Monsters in this book STINK, EAT CHILDREN, SUCK OUT BRAINS, GROWL, STEAL and tell UNFUNNY JOKES.” Armed with disgusting and creative defensive recipes against monsters, scientific data on all things terrifying and priceless illustrations, this book is a hard-cover must have.

Book covers courtesy:

The Spectacular Spectacle Man — TARA Publishing; Haroun and the Sea of Stories — Penguin/GRANTA; The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole — Puffin; The Giggler Treatment — Scholastic; The Boy with the Magic Numbers by Sally Gardner — Dolphin; The Monstrous Memoirs of a Mighty McFearless by Ahmet Zappa — Puffin

 

Digital imaging by Riddhi Parekh

 

Popularity: 6%