The children clicked photographs with the outline drawn by Devdutt Pattanaik as parents looked on amused. That was the start to the wonderful storytelling session by him. He talked about different Gods and their legends. The children listened attentively and took home moral values.

The Think Tank| Paro Anand

Paro Anand is an acclaimed writer who loves to see children happy and smiling. The session was a book reading one where she threw her voice impersonating the different characters from the story. She read out from ‘Wingless’- her book about a flightless bird.

The Workshop |Subhadra Sen Gupta

The children displayed their intelligence quotient as Subhadra Sen Gupta talked about history and all things past. It was followed by a quiz and the world map was explored. The session was a very interactive one.

The Glade| Deepa Agarwal

Deepa Agarwal narrated calmly the story from ‘Rajula’s Web of Magic and Danger’. The children sat enraptured as she spoke of adventurous journeys from an epic story from Uttarakhand. Later, she had the children write and read out their masterpieces.

The Workshop | Satoshi Kitamura

Sliding pictures and moving frames were the highlight of the session with Satoshi Kitamura. The parents and children gaped and applauded as the wooden theatre came alive with moving stories. The guessing game had everybody working their minds and figuring out what the picture shadows meant. It was a very interactive session.

The Think Tank | Ramendra Kumar

Ramendra Kumar perked the audience up doing a question answer round at the beginning of the session. He continued with a book reading of his book ‘Taal Betaal and Tyranny of Tsunami’. There was talk of ghosts and how he wrote about a ghost that had a purpose.

The Workshop | Shamini Flint

Shamini never fails to bring alive the child in everyone attending her wonderful sessions. She engaged the children in a thoughtful discussion about the steps of writing a story. Presentations were used to bring out the animation in the turtles she talked about.

The Glade | Gregory Hughes

Gregory Hughes’s calm manner always enthralls the audience and that’s what happened at this session too. He talked about how it is not cool to write in a phine voice- a voice that is put on. According to him, flowery writing doesn’t really go down well with every reader and its best to write in your own voice.

Think Tank | Samhita Arni

Samhita’s session yesterday flocked more audience towards her today as she continued with her strong knowledge of the Mahabharata and the Ramayana. Her session was one of the most interactive ones as she had kids doing most of the discussion. The amount of information the children had about the two Epics, was very amazing.

The Glade | Steve Skidmore and Steve Barlow

The 2Steves have so much under their hat that they will never run out of things to entertain the audience with. This session of theirs, which was a horror story act-out, was brimming with children and people of all ages. The costumes and masks just added to the appeal of the Ihorror show.

Vinita Krishna

Under the picturesque settings of the aptly named Kahaani Tree, Vinita Krishna’s charming tale set in a magical world of caterpillars, butterflies and rainbows captured the imaginations of her young and eager audience through a session which involved the children in the storytelling and singing just as much as the author herself.

John Dougherty

At the Kahaani Tree, Northern Irish author John Dougherty read out his book ‘Finn MacCool and the Giant’s Causeway’, a traditional Irish tale about a giant who reckons he’s the greatest giant of all and how his boasting lands him in a spot of bother. The reading coupled with a couple of songs mesmerised both children and parents alike.

Poile Sengupta

Poile Sengupta’s adorable tale of ‘Meeting Mr Tiger’ took the children on a vivid and wondrous journey through the jungles to, as the title suggests, meet Mr Tiger. Chanting ‘off we go to see the tiger’ and accompanied with Sengupta enacting the medley of the sounds of the forest, the interactive session engrossed the children.

Ramendra Kumar

A vegetarian cheetah, a donkey averse to singing, a tipsy elephant and an attractive tigress feature as the protagonists in Ramendra Kumar’s rib-tickling story ‘Roar of the Cheetah’. The tale told through narration and song sees Happy Kumar the cheetah marrying Aishwaria the tigress and had children and parents alike in stitches.

Kunzang Choden and Anita Roy

On a sunny Saturday afternoon, Bhutanese author Kunzang Choden’s story ‘Aunty Mouse’ captivated children gathered around the Kahaani Tree. The book tells the story about a mouse and an old lady living in Bhutan. The storytelling accompanied with posters of the country’s magnificent mountains fuelled young imaginations as they let their minds wander on a journey through the tiny kingdom.

Lovleen Mishra and Chatura Rao

Lovleen Mishra and Chatura Rao’s fascinating session under the shade of the Kahaani Tree looked at what the stories we love to read are made up of. Starting from the foundation of stories being words and then leading into the alphabets that make up the words, Mishra’s session proved to be both entertaining and educational.

Sandhya Rao

Under the shade of the Kahaani Tree on a warm Saturday afternoon, Sandhya Rao’s endearing book ‘Kutti Kutti Stories for Kutti Kutties’ was perfect for her young audience as she narrated a tale on little ones for little ones. There was plenty of interaction throughout the session as she encouraged her eager listeners to take part.

Deepa Balsavar

Deepa Balsavar’s session involved the telling of ‘Curious Monkey’, an adorable story about a monkey with plenty of questions on the animals and people he comes across. As Balsavar donned animal facemasks, children and their parents sat under the Kahaani Tree to be whisked away on an imaginary journey through the jungle.

The session was alive with anecdotes and an enthusiastic interaction with the children. Shamini Flint kept them active and guessing. She shared her experiences from Singapore and discussed the reasons she likes to write. It was a very interesting session on the whole.

The Amphitheatre | Adeline Foo

Adeline Foo is an acclaimed writer from Singapore. She talked about writing books for her son and how he loves reading books. Her book, The Diary of Amos Lee was inspired by The Diary of a Wimpy Kid. She called up kids upon the stage and had them read from the book, before she started the narration herself. There was an illustrated presentation and a question-answer round at the end.

The Studio | Adithi and Chatura Rao

Adithi and Chatura Rao began the session with explaining the map of Pandupur; the heart of their story. They both engaged the audience with the ‘Dhun song’ that the river of Pandupur gave them. The parents were as enthusiastic as the children. Each participant was rapt with attention as the sisters continued with their unique and interesting story telling.

The Pavilion | Prayag Shukla

The session by Prayag Shukla started with two of the students reciting one of his poems that features in their coursework as well. He kept them merrily singing a myriad of poems that spoke of sweet dishes and elephants. There was undoubting enthusiasm among the kids as more and more flocked towards the prolific poet.

The Amphitheatre| Steve Barlow and Steve Skidmore

Steve and Steve left no stone unturned to entertain the audience as well as they did yesterday. The session was alive with role play that made use of a lot of different costume hats. The kids took turns being super heroes, Vikings, space men and gladiators as they made their way through the stories in the books. There was a large audience and everybody participated heartily

The Pavillion| John Dougherty

John Dougherty is an Irish poet, singer and writer who uses humor to make children happy all around the world. His session had the children grasping the benefits of reading. He narrated his experiences with books and talked about the 3 books he has written about the Greek God Zeus. He impressed the audience with animated interaction while informing them about the process of writing a story.

The Amphitheatre| Gregory Hughes

Gregory Hughes guesses that every author wants their book to be made into a movie and hence, this session was about scriptwriting and its main components. A volunteer was called upon stage and made to experiment with the same. He then distributed an extract from his book and commenced the story narration.

The Studio| Samhita Arni

Samhita Arni talked about her portrayal of Sita in her graphic novel. She explores the feminist issues underlying the Ramayana. The Tamil version of the Ramayana was discussed as well and she pointed out the different themes that make up the essence of Ramayana. The kids were very vocal about their views and loved interacting with the author.

The Amphitheatre | Arjun Kaul

Arjun Kaul is the vocalist and guitarist of the band Prithvi. He interwove music and stories and played music that the children enjoyed immensely. He educated them about different characters from history and folktales. The audience also had a glimpse of his original work as he played a song from his album.

The Studio| Jeeva Raghunath

Jeeva never fails to delight with her amazing style of storytelling. The kids were having a lot of fun as she took them on an adventure with the birds and the mango tree. Her animated and expressive stories kept everybody captivated. The audience was full of her fans and the session was absolutely full.

The Pavillion| Campfire

Campfire organized a puppet show called Puppet Pandemonium. It was an interesting interactive session that had the kids involved with the hand puppets that narrated the stories. The kids enjoyed the different voice over’s as the happy parents looked on.

The Amphitheatre | Jeeva Raghunath

Jeeva Raghunath is a master storyteller with a myriad of voices that brings alive her stories, to the absolute delight of the kids. She started her session with a Tamil song and soon had the audience singing along. The children and parents alike, were completely engrossed in the onomatopoeic  narration of the story of the mountain and the bird.

The Amphitheatre | Marina Bollain

Marina is a Spanish actress and singer who recounts stories through songs. The session was alive with her beautiful voice and the accompanying strings. She narrated the story in song form and used umbrellas as props. The audience was enchanted by her exquisite and delicate manner as more and more people were drawn to her session.

The Studio| Shamini Flint

Shamini is a prolific writer and an equally good speaker. Her session with the children was about how she started to write. Her experiences included stories about her daughter and sons and the car she gave up for her baby. The children were engrossed in her tales and contributed heartily to the discussion.

The Pavilion | Adeline Foo

Adeline Foo hails from Singapore and in this session, she talked about her experiences that led her to writing the Diary of Amos Lee. She had an interactive session with the children where she answered their eager questions about the characters in the book. The audience was very impressed with the session.

– Supreet

“And the frog learnt to sing “crok…crok…crok…”

It was an amazing experience as Jeeva Raghunath, the master story teller, mesmerised the students with her song and dance and we all were left asking for more. Even the teachers became children swaying to her stories as she wove them into song and dance sequences from different parts of the world. Yet each one had a subtle message that the children understood immediately.

– Suprabha

What goes on behind a book is a fascinating story in itself. Today Adeline Foo delighted the kids by sharing her experiences of writing the famous Amos Lee series, including conceptualization, research, reader psychology, illustration style, editing, and finally publishing. The eager-beavers of Class IV were very familiar with Adeline’s books and many had brought them along for book signing.

What was wonderful, I think, was the effort the author put into keeping the children hooked on to her books. First she helped the kids do a little diary-writing exercise which would help them relate more to the book’s hero. She talked about Amos Lee as a real person and also gave out Amos Lee branded book-marks and badges, and was all-smiles when almost a hundred children lined up to get her autograph. Did you know that she maintains an excellent Amos Lee website and that she never lets a fan mail go unanswered?

– Divya

Margaret Read Macdonald is a popular American storyteller of traditional tales and folk tales from around the world. Her session at Bookaroo started with a brief introduction and she sat amidst children from different schools and narrated animatedly, from her book ‘The Fat Cat’. She made the session even more interesting with the wonderful onomatopoeia and the brief dancing. The teachers also joined in as the children heard her out with rapt attention.

The Kahani Tree saw Deepa Balsawar and Sandhya Gandhi Vakil bringing alive the historic tales of Akbar and Birbal. The story was accompanied by beautifully crafted paintings of the characters. The children were hooked on to the story and laughed merrily as the riveting story tellers came across the witty parts in the story.

The Amphitheatre was alive with the thunderous voices of the ‘2steves’ as they interacted with the children and filled them with anticipation and enthusiasm at the very beginning of the session. The talented authors turned actors then dressed up as Vikings who embarked on an adventure filled with choices and the children acted along with them.

Martin Widmark a writer from Sweden kept the young audience engaged with the detective stories that he writes. He used the medium of illustration to draw clues for the children and encouraged them to solve the mystery. Martin had the kids working their young brains and enjoying themselves as they did so.

Shamini Flint kick started the session with a fun question and answer round that perked up the children. She then talked about her books and the genre she writes in. It was a very interactive hour that had the kids guessing and enjoying her ideas as she spoke passionately about saving endangered animals and her experiences from Singapore.