List of Must-Read Books for Little Readers

If you are raising a little reader, I recommend you to follow the Neev Literature Festival to get to know about books, creators, illustrators, and publishers. The festival is now in its fourth year.

The Neev Literature Festival has announced the shortlist for the fourth edition of the ‘Neev Book Award’ for children’s literature. For the second consecutive year, the Neev Book Award will be announced online due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Over the years, the Neev Book Award has become a platform to showcase some of the best books for children in India with Indian characters and settings that children relate to and see aspects of their lives and their world reflected in the literature they read.

The shortlist for the 2021 edition is now out in four different categories — Early Years, Emerging Readers, Junior Readers, and Young Adult. The Neev Book Award 2021 Shortlist is diverse as it includes Indian children’s literature that explores history, the environment, adventure, fantasy, biographies, and realistic fiction. The shortlisted books reflect the challenges and excitement of a rapidly changing and rising India.

Award nominations were open to all publishers for children’s titles published in India in the year 2020. The Neev Book Award had 21 publishers submitting 114 nominations in four categories.

“I have always loved book prizes; their longlists, shortlists, and winners. In a world of content overload, we get overwhelmed without curation and often give up exhausted. The Neev Book Award offers a wholesome, diverse, and consistent curation of children’s books from and about Indian lives; books that are Mirrors, Windows and Doors to the Indian identity” says Kavita Gupta Sabharwal, Co-founder & Curator of Neev Literature Festival for Children.

The books shortlisted in each of the four categories for this year are:

Early Years:

· Cat, Come Back – Author -Lavanya Karthik, Illustrated by Ayeshe Sadr and Ishaan Dasgupta (Karadi Tales)

· Cat’s Diwali – Author – Sarah Paul, Illustrated by Urvashi Dubey (Daffodil Lane Books)

· Ammu and the Sparrows – Author -Vinitha R, Illustrated by Jayesh Sivan (Pratham Books)

· Thatha’s Pumpkin – Author -Lalita Iyer, Illustrated by Proiti Roy (Karadi Tales)

· The Big Thoughts of Little Luv – Author – Karan Johar, Illustrated by Priya Kuriyan (Juggernaut)

· Moodunnit – Author – CG Salamander, Illustrated by Aindri C (Duckbill)

Emerging Readers:

· Friends Behind Walls – Author – Harshikaa Udasi, Illustrated by Krishna Bala Shenoi (Puffin)

· Clockwala’s Clues – Author – Varsha Seshan (Duckbill)

· The Chirmi Chasers – Author – Arefa Tehsin (Duckbill)

· Mini’s Questions – Author – Nandini Nayar, Illustrated by Isha Nagar (Harper Children’s)

· Miracle on Sunderbaag Street – Author – Nandita da Cunha, Illustrated by Priya Kuriyan (Kalpavriksh)

Junior Readers:

· The Torchbearers – Author – AB Majumdar (Puffin)

· Young Pandavas: The City of Elephants – Author – Anupam Arunachalam (Hachette)

· No Nonsense Nandhini – Author – Aparna Karthikeyan (Karadi Tales)

· Journey to a Forbidden City – Author – Deepa Agarwal (Puffin)

· The Piano: Story of a Friendship – Author – Nandita Basu (Duckbill)

· The Adventures of the Kohinoor – Authors – William Dalrymple, Anita Anand and Devika Cariapa (Juggernaut)

Young Adult:

· Oonga – Author – Devashish Makhija (Tulika)

· Queen of Earth – Author – Devika Rangachari ( Duckbill)

· The Teenage Diary of Razia Sultan – Author – Anitha Murthy (Talking Cub)

· The Secret Life of Debbie G – Author – Vibha Batra, Illustrated by Kalyani Ganapathy (Harper Children’s)

· Nomad’s Land – Author – Paro Anand (Talking Cub)

· Gravepyres School for the Deceased – Author – Anita Roy (Red Panda)

The winners of the award will receive a cash prize of Rs 1 lakh each along with a citation. The prize winners in each category are being decided by a meticulously chosen jury of educators, writers, and teacher-librarians from across the globe.

The list of jury consists of 4 educators – Colin Kelman, Dr. Anuradha Ruhil Barua, Dr. Dhooleka Raj and Dr. Myra Garces-Bacsal; 3 writers – Rasil Ahuja, Gita Vardarajan, and Dr Kamakshi Murti and 2 school teacher-librarians – Katie Day and Nadine Bailey.

The winners of the Neev Book Award 2021 across all four categories are expected to be announced towards the end of September during the 5th edition of Neev Literature Festival.

This is a press release sent to us by the PR team of Neev Literature Festival.