Book Review - The Rumour, by Anushka Ravishankar

Recently, we received a lovely surprise in the mail – a copy of The Rumour, by Anushka Ravishankar.  The book had come all the way from Sandhya and her daughter in India.  We received the book as part of the Perfect Picture Books by Post swap hosted by Playing by the Book. 

Earlier we sent Sandhya and her family a copy of our favourite picture book – Diary of a Wombat, by Jackie French.  Sandhya blogged about the book at Saffron Tree.

 

The Rumour

by Anushka Ravishankar

 

In Baddbaddpur, an Indian village, the people are fond of telling tall tales.  One day, Pandurang, the town grump, coughs up a feather.  He tells his wife and asks her not to tell anyone.  She tells just one person, who tells just one person, until everyone has heard the rumour.  And with each telling the story gets more elaborate until Pandurang has a forest full of animals in his mouth.

The book is beautifully illustrated by Kanyika Kini.  Our favourite page was this image of the forest in Pandurang’s mouth …

The illustrations also show lots of details of Indian village life, especially the way the people dress and carry out their daily jobs.

We loved getting this wonderful book from Sandhya and her daughter and the story made us smile.  My eldest son, who is a budding fisherman, appreciated the way the rumour got more and more elaborate as the tale was retold (just the way that fish get bigger as you tell people about your fishing trip).