Book a Week 2020 - BW33: Pick a book by its cover

[Pen]

14 minutes ago, Dreamergal said:

Ah ! The script lettering is what I am teaching my four year old to exhaust her now. It has 12 vowels and 18 consonants. By the time she is through with it, the plan is I will get some respite 😂

 

What does the part in your mother tongue say? 

 

[Pen]

@Dreamergal

 

Here are other a few series  likely to be pretty wholesome for a 4 yo iirc and probably fairly accessible now or soon as read it herself, but not too babyish: 

https://www.amazon.com/Saturdays-Melendy-Quartet-Book-ebook/dp/B015MQS1Y8

https://www.amazon.com/While-Mrs-Coverlet-Was-Away/dp/0786816953

 

https://www.amazon.com/Original-Adventures-Hank-Cowdog/dp/1591881013

[Violet Crown]

4 hours ago, Dreamergal said:

Enid Blyton Malory Towers

My girls loved that series. They so much wanted me to send them to boarding school. 

[Pen]

I started thinking maybe I would like to revisit Danny the Meadow Mouse and friends myself and found most of those books both as e books and audio on Hoopla.

Check out The Adventures of Danny Meadow Mouse #hoopladigital
https://www.hoopladigital.com/title/11675809

 

and wow  - if I still had my childhood hardcover it might be worth hundreds of dollars now:

[ [ [ The Adventures of Danny Meadow Mouse [ THE ADVENTURES OF DANNY MEADOW MOUSE ] By Burgess, Thornton W ( Author )Jan-01-2009 Hardcover https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00BANRI1A/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_qchqFb0AP1RA7

 

 

VENTURES OF DANNY MEADOW MOUSE ] By Burgess, Thornton W ( Author )Jan-01-2009 Hardcover

 

 

 

 

1. 

---

Format: Hardcover

---

 

 

 

 

$ 902 81 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited August 22, 2020 by Pen

[mumto2]

5 hours ago, Pen said:

@mumto2 if you haven’t started Monkeys Raincoat yet, you might want to start into the series at Voodoo River - main character is getting to be less of a cardboard PI character  (though perhaps not yet as dimensional and compelling as Maggie the dog) and some important relationships are developing ... 

Thank you!  I have been avoiding it becauseI didn’t feel like having to be online to read it.  Just put myself on the hold list for Voodoo River which is a Kindle book. 🙂  I was just starting to respond when our power went out because we had another spectacular storm.  After living in England which has thunder and lightening maybe twice a year this everyday business is taking some getting used to.  Power is back and all is well!

I have been busy with the stack of cozyish mysteries that I checked out that all expire in the next few days.  I finished  The Secrets of Bones https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/51179867-the-secrets-of-bones which was by Kylie Logan who started my search for dog rescue books that were good with the dog actually featured after her first in this series was a flop for me.  Secrets of the Bones was much better with a good mystery after a cadaver dog finds a body(skeleton) during the career day at the school where the main character works.  Enough dog bits to be acceptable! 😉

I also read the 25th (bingo square) bookin a favorite book series about dogs, usually poodles.  Game of Dog Bones was a fun romp with favorite characters.  One new to me concept was a doggie coffee shop,  where you play with adoptable pups while you drink your coffee.  The one in the book left a great deal to be desired as the puppies were actually being sold from puppy mills created to supply the cafe but I hope to go visit one sometime......they have cat cafes too.  Yes I googled myself into quite the rabbit trail........I forgot to check for bunny cafe’s.😉

@Dreamergal  My Dd was also a precocious reader.  She loved mythology ay that age and read several of different retellings.  You might want to check out titles at bookshark https://www.bookshark.com/ .  We used most of these lists in our home school and most were hits.  Each grade has both readers and read aloud.  We also loved Wizard of Oz......might still be free on kindle.  I think there were 14 volumes......I loved reading these aloud but would Dd read them to me when I closed my eyes! 😂  I used to have to catch up in the morning!

 

[Pen]

20 minutes ago, Dreamergal said:

Look at the price of that book !! 😱

I have to thank my mom and grandma for keeping our books. We used to bind them because my brother was so rough on them. They've lasted so many years and I carried much back with me. 

 

I had the whole set once!!! But we moved too much and had too small homes or otherwise weren’t in circumstances to keep things like that.  Also, putting a $900 tag on it doesn’t mean they’ll get that.  🤔. Anyway they were probably read by a number of kids over the years since they left me. So, all good, but it was rather striking when I saw the price. 

 

And anyway it looks like it can still be bought (perhaps with thinner paper and paper back ) for $3 as a Dover Classic! 

 

 

What about Magic Tree House series btw?   Does your daughter find that too babyish?  My son liked them a lot and they led to interesting rabbit trails learning more about Mozart or Louis Armstrong or others “met “ in the series. 

 

Edited August 22, 2020 by Pen

[Pen]

Now reading:

The Adventures Of Danny Meadow Mouse

😁

[Kareni]

1 hour ago, mumto2 said:

 One new to me concept was a doggie coffee shop,  where you play with adoptable pups while you drink your coffee.  The one in the book left a great deal to be desired as the puppies were actually being sold from puppy mills created to supply the cafe but I hope to go visit one sometime......they have cat cafes too.  Yes I googled myself into quite the rabbit trail........I forgot to check for bunny cafe’s.😉

Such cafes are huge in South Korea. My daughter sent a picture of herself at a reptile cafe holding a very large snake. Ahh, no thank you! There are games cafes where you can play their games. For a time, my daughter worked at an English cafe. People would pay to come in and chat in English and also to read the English language books. Food and drinks are often not served at such cafes.

Regards,

Kareni

[Violet Crown]

My understanding is that some used booksellers add several hundred dollars to the price of a sold book they expect to have in stock again, to avoid the hassle of de-listing the book until they have another copy. So that seller may have just sold a copy for $2.81 and inflated the price to prevent anyone from trying to order it.

[Little Green Leaves]

16 hours ago, Dreamergal said:

Sound and Fury was unsettling to read, can't quite describe it except rampaging words on a page. 

Little House Books seem to be books many adults like to read even during a non-pandemic. I have books like that too, Enid Blyton Malory Towers  series for instance. Never gelled with LHOP. Will look into the Trumpet of the Swan. I want my little girl to read more classic American  kids books so I am reading up on them first, perhaps I should read it with her. 

"Rampaging words on a page" was about how I felt about Faulkner too. Except that for me it was very positive. I don't think I read Sound and Fury but I loved Absalom Absalom and Light in August. I could not get through Sanctuary.

What kinds of books do kids read in India? Are any of them translated into English? Asking for my kids.

Edited August 22, 2020 by Little Green Leaves

[Violet Crown]

Update: Wee Girl has AT LAST been defeated in the Crown Family Coronatide Reading Competition. We altered the rules so the rest of us are on one team and Wee Girl on a team by herself, the winner being the first team to get to ten books. It came down to Wee Girl and Middle Girl staying up late to finish Book Ten, and Middle Girl won by a mere half hour. Victory is sweet!

Edited August 22, 2020 by Violet Crown

[Pen]

Just now, Dreamergal said:

Thanks for suggesting Absalom Absalom. Never heard of it. Sound and Fury was my first taste of Faulkner and I retreated. But Absalom, Absalom from the name suggests father son conflict and and anguish in the end if I extrapolate heavily from the Bible. I think I will stick to audio book though, I usually find them more stimulating, written is more peaceful. But Faulkner and words on a page seems to be a different beast all together in my brief experience. It's like they rampage inside your head. 

I'll write another post about kids books in India. Too long to write now. 

 

My favorite was Light in August (I remember it was favorite and yet not a lot about it...  race issues and South USA might actually be of interest, and I think the story was more straightforward.)   I did not finish Absalom, Absalom  iirc ... 

[Little Green Leaves]

2 hours ago, Dreamergal said:

Thanks for suggesting Absalom Absalom. Never heard of it. Sound and Fury was my first taste of Faulkner and I retreated. But Absalom, Absalom from the name suggests father son conflict and and anguish in the end if I extrapolate heavily from the Bible. I think I will stick to audio book though, I usually find them more stimulating, written is more peaceful. But Faulkner and words on a page seems to be a different beast all together in my brief experience. It's like they rampage inside your head. 

I'll write another post about kids books in India. Too long to write now. 

Yes -- absolutely, it's about father-son conflict and anguish; it's also about slavery, racism, brutality. Some of the words from that book are STILL rampaging inside my head.

I'm looking forward to your post about kids' books in India!

[LaughingCat]

On 8/19/2020 at 3:13 PM, Kareni said:

My daughter read Melusine and further books in that series after reading The Goblin Emperor; she also said that they were quite dissimilar. Have you read Addison's most recent work, The Angel of the Crows? I'm looking forward to her next book which is to be set in the world of the Goblin Emperor.

Regards,

Kareni

I have The Angel of the Crows on hold at the library, hopefully will get in the next few weeks 🙂

[aggieamy]

22 hours ago, Matryoshka said:

Don't ever pick up Catcher in the Rye.  Just sayin'.

 

 I read this in high school just for fun. My cousin went to a fancy prep school that had required summer reading and I went to plain ol' public school that didn't. One night I spent the night at her house and didn't bring a book but her summer reading book -- Catcher in the Rye -- was laying about so I read it and loved it. Something about it super appealed to me as a high school girl. I have not picked it back up because I'm sure I would be wildly disappointed in it now and I want to hang on to that memory. 

19 hours ago, Violet Crown said:

My girls loved that series. They so much wanted me to send them to boarding school. 

I picked up Roald Dahl's autobiography to read to John and then read a few chapters to see if it would be something appropriate for his age and am hooked. It's fantastically interesting. It would make your girls rethink boarding school. Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad as a girl or if you're a wizard. Sounded pretty horrific for a nine-year-old boy in 1925 though.

And congrats on the victory against Wee Girl!

Edited August 22, 2020 by aggieamy

[mumto2]

35 minutes ago, LaughingCat said:

I have The Angel of the Crows on hold at the library, hopefully will get in the next few weeks 🙂

I just put the audiobook on hold......

[Pen]

 

56 minutes ago, aggieamy said:

 

I picked up Roald Dahl's autobiography to read to John and then read a few chapters to see if it would be something appropriate for his age and am hooked. It's fantastically interesting. It would make your girls rethink boarding school. Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad as a girl or if you're a wizard. Sounded pretty horrific for a nine-year-old boy in 1925 though.

 

CS Lewis’s autobiography is also very good and can similarly be a rethink on boarding school.  

 

 

[Penguin]

Well, I absolutely love reading Faulkner. Total fan.  I am currently half way through Light in August, which is my seventh Faulkner novel. 
 

Structurally, Light in August is one of the easier ones to read. It is assigned in high school sometimes.

[Robin M]

@Dreamergal  Does your little girl like art?  James and I enjoyed Laurence Anholt's Magical Garden of Claude Monet.  James Mayhew's  Katie and the Mona Lisa. 

[Little Green Leaves]

14 hours ago, Dreamergal said:

@Little Green Leaves

India has a lot of folk tales, fables, myths, legends and religious epics from the BC onwards that have survived and are read till now. They were mostly originally written in Sanskrit and all are translated into various Indian languages and English too. There are officially 22 languages in India with their own unique script (each state has it's own language and script and many more that are spoken so there is a rich oral tradition as well and much of it has been captured in books. These three are some of the cornerstones of Indian stories that are myths/fables/folk tales and have a moral

The Panchatanra one of the oldest collection is a collection of animal fables. This is from Hinduism

Jataka tales are a collection of stories about previous births of Buddha in both animal and human form. This is written in the Pali language which is similar to Sanskrit.

Hitopadesha are more "contemporary" in that it was written close to 1000 years ago.

The Big two Indian epics are the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. These were in Sanskrit originally.

Then there are these little stories of various Hindu Gods taking on avatars (rebirth) for a purpose which is mostly to destroy evil or teach a lesson.

Advisors in Indian History

India has a lot of history stretching back to BC. There are these tales especially of advisors to kings who were so good in wisdom and problem solving skills their stories have endured. One of them was Birbal, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birbal) an advisor to the grandfather of the emperor who built the Taj Mahal  and Tenali Raman (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenali_Ramakrishna) who was an advisor to a king in South India. 

There is a company called Amar Chitra Katha which means Immortal Picture Stories who serialized in grahic novel form all of these and Indian history in a magazine and also books from my generation onward in many Indian languages and English.

British and Indian Authors who wrote books in English based in India

Rudyard Kipling (British author of Jungle Book and RikiTikiTavi)

Ruskin Bond (British descent Indian author who writes novels but famous for his children's books)

R K Narayan. He is one of the first Indian authors to write in English. Malgudi Days is one of his best known works.

British authors like Roald Dahl, Enid Blyton are even now a perpetual favorite. Belgian and French comics translated like Adventures of Tintin and Adventures of Astrix were also very popular in my time and still are.

Penguin classics had books of British Classics of authors like Jane Austen, Charles Dickens to name a few. American authors were Mark Twain and Louisa May Alcott. I am not sure what is available now.

Manga (Japanese comics) which has different genres was and still is very popular. These are in English.

American books wise, in my time it was Archie comics, Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys.

Now there are Indian children authors who write in English. 

Harry Potter is very popular, I would say more contemporary British than American. I don't see a lot of American books except Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Hunger Games, Percy Jackson. 

Lots of reading and magazines for kids are still popular.

Thank you so much for this list! I'm totally intrigued. The world is enormous and there is so much to learn about. I've just taken a quick look at the Amar Chitra Katha site and will really enjoy reading up on the rest of these ideas.

[Little Green Leaves]

18 hours ago, Dreamergal said:

I am strange in that I love the name Absalom enough to consider naming my kid that if he was more a Solomon. David is my absolute favorite character in the Bible, Old or New after Jesus. The anguish of David when he cries after Absalom died has always made me tear up only next to "My God, My God why has Thou forsaken me". Also slavery, racism, brutality is not something I shy away. But when I meant rampaging is more the writing style not the content.

I had difficulty with Hemmingway's style too until I was told it was magical reality. Never heard of it before. Does Faulkner have a style of writing that has a name ? 

I will definitely read this book and push myself to do it even if I have to do it over a period of time with breaks. Absalom and David's story is one of my absolutely favorites in the Bible despite the tragedy and if this has echoes of it, I will definitely read it. Thanks for the suggestion. 

I had trouble with Hemingway, honestly. I mean, I loved A Moveable Feast, but that book was easy to read because it was so gossipy. I can think of a few stories I've really loved, but I never made any headway with the others. Which Hemingway do you recommend? I never thought of him as writing magical realism and that appeals to me very much.

I hope you love Absalom Absalom.

[Matryoshka]

22 minutes ago, Little Green Leaves said:

I had trouble with Hemingway, honestly. I mean, I loved A Moveable Feast, but that book was easy to read because it was so gossipy. I can think of a few stories I've really loved, but I never made any headway with the others. Which Hemingway do you recommend? I never thought of him as writing magical realism and that appeals to me very much.

I've only ever read one Hemingway, in high school, and haven't had the urge to read more - but I'd never heard of his writing described as magical realism?  Is there really some magic in his writing? From other things I've read about it, it seems mostly a bunch of testosterone with few words (as opposed to flowery).  I have had A Moveable Feast on my TR list for ages, as I'd heard elsewhere that was good and different from his other writing...

Quote

I hope you love Absalom Absalom.

I flat out hated the only Faulkner I've tried so far (As I Lay Dying), but it didn't have any themes I could glean (or anyone else could share with me) other than stupid people are stupid and do stupid things.  Since it wasn't the actual writing I hated (but the story), and apparently most of his writing tackled tons of meaty themes and everyone else seems to love him, I have decided to give him one more go - think I'm leaning toward Absalom, Absalom.  After trying a 'starter' Faulkner and having such a bad experience, I'm thinking I should head straight for 'the good stuff'...

[aggieamy]

1 hour ago, Little Green Leaves said:

I had trouble with Hemingway, honestly. I mean, I loved A Moveable Feast, but that book was easy to read because it was so gossipy. I can think of a few stories I've really loved, but I never made any headway with the others. Which Hemingway do you recommend? I never thought of him as writing magical realism and that appeals to me very much.

I hope you love Absalom Absalom.

 

1 hour ago, Matryoshka said:

I've only ever read one Hemingway, in high school, and haven't had the urge to read more - but I'd never heard of his writing described as magical realism?  Is there really some magic in his writing? From other things I've read about it, it seems mostly a bunch of testosterone with few words (as opposed to flowery).  I have had A Moveable Feast on my TR list for ages, as I'd heard elsewhere that was good and different from his other writing...

I've never warmed to Hemingway (by which I mean I actively disliked most of his books) but I did like A Moveable Feast for the same reasons Little Leaves did. Magical Realism? I don't see that at all in anything I've read by him. Actually that's the opposite of how I would have described him. Realism realism is more like it.

[Matryoshka]

43 minutes ago, Dreamergal said:

First, major caveats ahead.

Most of what I know about writing styles is self taught by reading. I am still confused by magical reality vs fantasy. For instance, is Harry Potter magical reality or fantasy ? A mixture of both ?  The way I understand magical reality is it is firmly set in the real world but with magical elements added. The books that is not ambiguous about it is Salman Ruthie's Midnight's Children to me.

When I read it I just knew the writing style was  "different". The same thing with Hemingway, the writing style was "different" though I could not pinpoint why. So I went looking and found out about magical realism. As I was looking, Hemingway came up repeatedly because of something called the "Iceberg Theory". (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iceberg_theory). I have read people comparing it with magical reality. The books I remember the most were repeated were For whom the Bells toll and A Farewell to Arms.

I don't remember exactly where but it was about writing styles a long time ago. 

Harry Potter is fantasy.  If there are wizards, magical beasts, and well, flat-out magic and spells, that's fantasy.

Magical realism is much more subtle.  It's like it's our regular real world, but sometimes magical things happen, but they're treated just kind of every day real life.  This style came out of South America and is most associated with Latin American authors, although it did jump the pond to Spain, and I've seen it used much more widely and in English and other languages more recently, but when I recently described a just-published book that I thought used magical realism (by a Georgian author writing in German) I was told that 'magical realism' is still associated with Latin American authors and the wider, newer stuff is 'fabulism'.  Ooookay.  I saw no difference.  The ur-daddies of magical realism are I think Borges and Gabriel García Márquez.  ETA: The article I link below points out that there are some works in this vein that pre-date these guys - I agree that Kafka's Metamorphosis (and much of his other work) would meet the definition even if was written decades before in another continent...

Merriam Webster defines it as a literary genre or style associated especially with Latin America that incorporates fantastic or mythical elements into otherwise realistic fiction.  I think this definition is limiting, and am more in agreement with this article- What is Magical Realism? -  which says the style has moved beyond Latin America and includes works in its examples from many countries (although I'd disagree with them that Ocean at the End of the Lane by Gaiman is MR - I'd classify it - and most of his other stuff - as regular old fantasy.  But it does get blurry!  However, in the next sentence it mentions that Gaiman has spent decades making up magical worlds.  If it's a magical world, it's not the real world, hence, not magical realism).

I do not think Hemingway is at all MR??  The Iceberg Theory article you linked just said he didn't explain everything and made stuff up - 'making stuff up' is just fiction. It doesn't say anything about magical realism?  I always got the sense that he was, if anything, too realistic for me (shut up about the stupid fish, old man!).  Hyperrealism?

Edited August 23, 2020 by Matryoshka

[aggieamy]

4 minutes ago, Matryoshka said:

(shut up about the stupid fish, old man!

Preach it sister! And I don't ever need to read details of an old man peeing off the side of a boat. Ever. 

My real life already consists of lots of peeing on car tires or trees or on occasion the toilet seat lid because six-year-old boys wait until it's an emergency situation to go to the bathroom. 

Edited August 23, 2020 by aggieamy

[Little Green Leaves]

43 minutes ago, Dreamergal said:

First, major caveats ahead.

Most of what I know about writing styles is self taught by reading. I am still confused by magical reality vs fantasy. For instance, is Harry Potter magical reality or fantasy ? A mixture of both ?  The way I understand magical reality is it is firmly set in the real world but with magical elements added. The books that is not ambiguous about it is Salman Ruthie's Midnight's Children to me.

When I read it I just knew the writing style was  "different". The same thing with Hemingway, the writing style was "different" though I could not pinpoint why. So I went looking and found out about magical realism. As I was looking, Hemingway came up repeatedly because of something called the "Iceberg Theory". (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iceberg_theory). I have read people comparing it with magical reality. The books I remember the most were repeated were For whom the Bells toll and A Farewell to Arms.

I don't remember exactly where but it was about writing styles a long time ago. 

So is the idea that there is magic lurking just beneath the surface in Hemingway's writing? Something marvelous underneath all that Realism? 

I think that's a cool idea and it definitely makes me want to try Hemingway again.

The conventional explanation for magical realism, as least as I was taught it, is that the idea was popularized by the Cuban writer Alejo Carpentier, mid century. Carpentier wrote an essay arguing that the richness and diversity of Latin America led naturally to what he called the "marvelous real." He was also contrasting what he saw as the vitality and sincerity of Latin America against European surrrealism, which distanced people from their environments instead of bringing them closer to it. The simple way to put it, I guess, us that magic really does exist in some places and that magical realism is just authors writing down what they see with their own eyes.

It looks like so many people hate the Old Man and the Sea that of course now I'm really curious. Maybe I'll put it on my list. 

[Junie]

"I liked The Old Man and the Sea," said Junie quietly, from the corner of the room...

[aggieamy]

Just now, Junie said:

"I liked The Old Man and the Sea," said Junie quietly, from the corner of the room...

Amy smiles at Junie. "We can still be friends."

[Robin M]

Week 34 is live - Please join me in the new thread to continue our conversation

[Matryoshka]

3 minutes ago, Dreamergal said:

Yes, this explains better what I wanted to articulate about Hemingway and MR. Like much is left to your imagination through the spartan prose. I am not explaining well, but there is magic lurking beneath what you see ! 

Any Magic realism that I've seen doesn't leave the any of the magic to your imagination!  Nor is the prose spartan...

If anyone has a specific Hemingway book that exemplifies this, I may now be curious enough to give it a try!

[Matryoshka]

20 minutes ago, Dreamergal said:

Have you read Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children ? It is magical reality in that it is set in the time just after Indian Independence and Partition (when Pakistan was formed).  The protagonist is telepathic and born at the exact same moment India attains independence. Salman Rushdie's writing style especially in this book is what he calls chutnified which he includes Hindi and Urdu words which he does not translate. But the prose is generally very spartan in my opinion. I am mostly used to his style. I am not explaining it well.

I have not - the only Rushdie I've read so far is Haroun and the Sea of Stories, which I'd call straight-up fantasy.  But that book is also included in the article I linked as being magical realism, and the magical part certainly does not appear to be left for the reader to imagine for themselves!  Sounds like an interesting book, I should add it to my TR list...

Quote

As for Hemingway, I have heard For whom the Bells toll and Farewell to Arms referenced. 

I am not familiar with South American literature a lot, so never heard of magical reality until Midnight's Children when I went looking for what seemed to be different. There is a strong possibility I am completely misunderstanding everything. 😊. 

I think a couple of my favorites are The Murmur of Bees (a fairly recently written one; I think it's just been translated) by Sofía Segovia, and Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel, both of which are Mexican.  Isabel Allende, who I like, also writes magical realism, but in many of her newer books she's moved away from it.  I'm not as big a fan of García Márquez and especially Borges.  Borges to me reads more like documentation of acid trips... not my cuppa.  Some of Kafka reads like that to me too!

Edited August 23, 2020 by Matryoshka

[Matryoshka]

5 minutes ago, Dreamergal said:

Midnight's Children is his best book in my opinion. But I am biased because of the content, but it made me see the whole story of Independence which was honestly dry in a whole different and fresh way. If awards are anything to go by, this won the Booker Prize of the Booker Prize which is a special prize awarded to Booker winners during landmark anniversaries.

I love books that are well-written and engaging and also teach me something about history!  I'll definitely have to read this.  Haroun I didn't find all that great, so I hadn't been in a huge rush to read other stuff by him.  Good to have a recommendation! 🙂 

Quote

I need to read The Murmur of Bees, but I did see the Like Water for Chocolate Movie. 

This is one of the very, very few instances where I'd say if you've seen the movie, you don't have to read the book.  Laura Esquivel I think both wrote the screenplay and directed - I don't think I've ever seen a movie so true to the book!  And it was well done.

I hope more people get to read The Murmur of Bees - I really liked it.

Edited August 23, 2020 by Matryoshka

[Laurel-in-CA]

On 8/22/2020 at 4:40 PM, Dreamergal said:

@Little Green Leaves

India has a lot of folk tales, fables, myths, legends and religious epics from the BC onwards that have survived and are read till now. They were mostly originally written in Sanskrit and all are translated into various Indian languages and English too. There are officially 22 languages in India with their own unique script (each state has it's own language and script and many more that are spoken so there is a rich oral tradition as well and much of it has been captured in books. These three are some of the cornerstones of Indian stories that are myths/fables/folk tales and have a moral

The Panchatanra one of the oldest collection is a collection of animal fables. This is from Hinduism

Jataka tales are a collection of stories about previous births of Buddha in both animal and human form. This is written in the Pali language which is similar to Sanskrit.

Hitopadesha are more "contemporary" in that it was written close to 1000 years ago.

The Big two Indian epics are the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. These were in Sanskrit originally.

Then there are these little stories of various Hindu Gods taking on avatars (rebirth) for a purpose which is mostly to destroy evil or teach a lesson.

Advisors in Indian History

India has a lot of history stretching back to BC. There are these tales especially of advisors to kings who were so good in wisdom and problem solving skills their stories have endured. One of them was Birbal, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birbal) an advisor to the grandfather of the emperor who built the Taj Mahal  and Tenali Raman (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenali_Ramakrishna) who was an advisor to a king in South India. 

There is a company called Amar Chitra Katha which means Immortal Picture Stories who serialized in grahic novel form all of these and Indian history in a magazine and also books from my generation onward in many Indian languages and English.

British and Indian Authors who wrote books in English based in India

Rudyard Kipling (British author of Jungle Book and RikiTikiTavi)

Ruskin Bond (British descent Indian author who writes novels but famous for his children's books)

R K Narayan. He is one of the first Indian authors to write in English. Malgudi Days is one of his best known works.

British authors like Roald Dahl, Enid Blyton are even now a perpetual favorite. Belgian and French comics translated like Adventures of Tintin and Adventures of Astrix were also very popular in my time and still are.

Penguin classics had books of British Classics of authors like Jane Austen, Charles Dickens to name a few. American authors were Mark Twain and Louisa May Alcott. I am not sure what is available now.

Manga (Japanese comics) which has different genres was and still is very popular. These are in English.

American books wise, in my time it was Archie comics, Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys.

Now there are Indian children authors who write in English. 

Harry Potter is very popular, I would say more contemporary British than American. I don't see a lot of American books except Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Hunger Games, Percy Jackson. 

Lots of reading and magazines for kids are still popular.

If you'd like to similarly explore western mythology and epics with your daughter, we've really enjoyed retellings by Geraldine McCaughrean, a British author who does meaty retellings of things from Gilgamesh to Arthur, Canterbury Tales, El Cid, and more. There are some pictures but more text so for us they were definitely a read-aloud but one we really enjoyed.