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Author: Sadhana Ramchander
Art by: Ragini Siruguri with help from Taposhi Ghoshal
ISBN 81-87649-89-5 [English]
ISBN 81-89020-85-4 [Hindi]
Size: 10” x 8”
Pages: 20
Price: 75
2004

Autorickshaw blues and other colours

This great book by a mother-daughter team is all about you! A refreshing look at the parent-child relationship through poems.

Sadhana works as a consultant editor. This is her first book for children. Ragini is 10 years old. Besides drawing and painting, she likes music, reading, craft and puppetry.

Taposhi is an illustrator and designer for children's books.

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Author: Geeta Dharmarajan
Art by: Enrique Lara and Luis Garcia
ISBN 81-89020-40-4 [hb]
ISBN 81-89020-44-7 [pb]
ISBN 81-89020-66-8 [hindi]
Size: 8” x 10”
Pages: 32
Price: Rs 150  [hb], Rs 120  [pb], Rs 80 [hindi]
2005

Earthsong

... Our Earth's a gift in green and blue
To men and women, children too
So let's enjoy this planet rare
Let's remember to care and share ...
A lyrical tribute to the earth and its amazing diversity, by Geeta Dharmarajan. With fun facts, information and superb, out-of-the-world artwork by Enrique Lara and Luis Garcia.

Enrique Lara Robayo studied graphic design at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia. He loves to write and illustrate and works as a freelance illustrator and as a university teacher.

Luis Fernando García Guayara studied graphic design at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia. He has always enjoyed playing with plasticine. After his degree, he started teaching claywork and origami to children in his art classes. He also works as a freelance illustrator and college teacher.

Friends since their university days, Enrique and Luis have worked together on several illustration projects. Their artwork in Leaves, their earlier book published by Katha, won an Encouragement Prize from the NOMA Concours for Picture Book Illustrations in 2000.

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Author: Madhavi S Mahadevan
Art by: Srivi
ISBN 81-89020-30-7 [hb]
81-89020-29-3 [pb]
ISBN 81-89020-36-6 [hindi
Size: 11” x 8.5”
Pages: 40.
Price: Rs 200 [hb], . Rs 175 [pb], . Rs 95 [hindi]
2005

Hanuman's Adventures in the Nether World

The master magician, Mayil Ravana, has cast a stupendous spell! He has kidnapped Rama and Lakshmana. Now, no one can ever find their way to the Lotus Kingdom to rescue the princes.

But, wait! There goes Hanuman, the son of the swishing wind, and a trusted friend of the princes, gliding across the bluest sky in search of the nether world. He dares through crashing waves, fire-sparks and mirror-demons, to blow out the slithering flames under the sea.
Slip into your invisible diving suits   for a splashing, big adventure!

Madhavi S Mahadevan’s past avatars include bookseller, advertising copywriter and also, associate editor with Katha. She has published several short stories for children in magazines like Target, Children's World, Tinkle, Deccan Herald and in anthologies of prize-winning stories published by CBT. She likes reading suspense stories and loves dogs. Madhavi is based presently in Bangalore.

Srisrividhiya K or Srivi is a designer, writer and a visualizer. She holds a masters degree with distinction in Fine Arts from Stella Maris College and is currently working in Amber Valley Residential School, Chikmaglur, Karnataka. Srivi loves children and likes teaching them drawing and story-book making. She has co-designed the interiors of the children's ward at Sankara Netralaya, Chennai. She has held several exhibitions of her paintings, is a trained Bharatnatyam dancer, and art, mythology and poetry are among her varied interests.

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Author: Geeta Dharmarajan
Art by Sonali Biswas
ISBN 81-89020-74-9 [English]
81-89020-97-8 [Hindi]
Size: 8.25 x 6
Pages: 32
Price: Rs 80
2006

Ma Ganga and the Razai Box

A delightful story that combines mythology and contemporary environmental issues. A miffed Ganga, an awakened hill people – together they spread once again Shiva’s matted locks – the mesh of roots and branches holding back the topsoil from being swept away by the river.

Geeta Dharmarajan loves writing stories for children. She conceived and edited a children’s magazine called Tamasha!, named after a big fat elephant created by her. Tamasha and her friends Hulgul the monkey and Chichinda the snake – were a great hit with children. Geeta was earlier one of the editors of Target, a magazine for children, and The Pennsylvania Gazette, the magazine of the Ivy League University of Pennsylvania. She has 16 books and over 400 published pieces to her credit. She started Katha in 1988 and has been its principal team leader since then.

Sonali Biswas is a freelance illustrator based in Delhi. She is the recipient of The Chitra Katha Award 2003 for Outstanding Illustrations for One Lonely Unicorn, a story-counting book published by Katha. She has also received the Runner-Up award from Noma Concours for Children’s Book Illustrations in 2000 and an Honourable Mention at the Biennial of Asian Illustrators, Japan in 2002.

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Author: Mamang Dai
Art by Srivi
ISBN 81-89020-32-3 [ English]
ISBN 81-89020-82-X [ Hindi]
Size: 8.25” x 6”
Pages: 32
Price: Rs 75
2005

The Sky Queen

The clouds form her silken white robes. Her sweat and tears are running water and rain. Her voice rings out in the sweet songs of the birds and humming insects. She is Nyanyi Myete of the lovely, ever changing natural world, the glorious celestial aunt of the Kojum-Koja.

A superb retelling of an age-old classic folk tale from Arunachal Pradesh.

Mamang Dai is a journalist who has travelled extensively in India and abroad. She is a member of the North East Writers’ Forum and has published a number of poems and short stories in various journals and magazines. Her popular work includes Arunachal Pradesh: The Hidden Land and the River Poems.

Srisrividhiya K or Srivi is a writer and a visualizer. She holds a masters degree with distinction in Fine Arts from Madras University and is currently working in a residential school. She has held quite a few exhibitions of her paintings and is a trained Bharatnatyam dancer.

Earthsong:
Geeta Dharmarajan has a unique way of adding life even to the most boring subjects. If you read Earthsong, you’ll realize it’s not the environmental studies book you must have read in school. Or maybe it is, just a better one, a much better one. The book opens with a little poem, which almost sounds like a version of the "All things are bright and beautiful" song you learnt in school.

— The New Indian Express

Hanuman’s Adventures in the Nether World:
A great read for young children, this creative and highly visual text can and should also be read alound, by both children and adults, or even dramatized, to bring history and mythology alive.

— Parenting

Ma Ganga and the Razai Box:
Young Yasho of the Hill people is the protagonist of Ma Ganga and the Razai Box. Though young, she bears the responsibility of finding a solution to the problem of soil erosion that is depriving her village of the fertile top soil required for cultivation of crops. An added problem is the scarcity of water, as a peeved Ma Ganga has decided not to run her course and instead sleep inside Yasho’s razai box, till the Hill people find Shiva’s matted locks over which she can flow. Complete with vibrant and dramatic illustrations, the story, written by Geeta Dharmarajan, weaves environmental concerns like pollution, soil erosion and desertification with mythology, without losing out on the simple human tale.

— The Hindu

A wonderful blend of simple text and beautiful pictures, "Ma Ganga and the Razai Box", brought out by Katha, is author Geeta Dharmarajan's timely gift to the kids. It tells them about mythological and environmental issues concerning the holy river and more importantly about something that everyone has apparently overlooked - that Ma Ganga is miffed.

—Young World, The Hindu

A very likeable rendition of the Ganga saga for children... The tone, the discussion, the notes at the end…all function and exercise their weight at just the right pithc. Thoroughtly recommended.

— Parenting

A pictorially rich book which is a little over 15 pages, it calls for an absorbing read. Interesting nuggets are presented on soil preservation and on the significance of the holy Ganga. Art and illustrations by Sonali Biswas are captivating as the colours used and images traced promise to hold children’s attention.

— The Statesman

The Sky Queen:
What strikes us most about Mamang Dai's The Sky Queen is its bright colour illustrations that are sprawled across the 30 odd pages of the book.

The author weaves out a fairytale, about a civilisation called Kojum-Koja, and how on the occasion of the Pime, tragedy befell them. The land of the Kojum-Koja is devastated by floods and gales, and is wiped off from the face of the Earth.

The second part of the book witnesses the rise of Nyanyi Myete, the lady of the Kojum family out of the ruins. With her sweet songs and music, she once again breathes life into the world.

The illustrations in the book are done in bright colours, mainly bold pastels. The gaiety and festivity held during the course of the story, are well depicted through the illustrations, along with the costumes and jewellery of the north east Indian community.

Mamang spins an adorable folk tale around the bounty of nature, and paints a pretty picture through her pen, of tribes of Arunachal Pradesh.

—The New Indian Express