A heart-warming and uplifting story, The Best Idea of All by Varsha Seshan (Karadi Tales) is a small chapter book for middle graders. It tells the tale three enterprising young girls who want to spend their free time being creative with noble thoughts in their mind.
Siblings Antara and Tarini with their friend Salma are up to something. They are working on an idea. It is the month of March, with Holi just round the corner. Without any adults to help, they are making natural Holi colours at home, secretly. Using readily available ingredients from their kitchen and garden flowers, they want to do it all on their own. Their earnings will go to charity. What noble thoughts! But, why keep it all a secret from mama, papa, nana and nani? They are exasperated and tired of the adults continued mantra ‘When we were your age, we did this, we did that, we did not have this’ and so on and so on.
They want to prove that they too could do something cool and unique which the adults may have not done in their younger days. Without their interventions and list of ‘Do’s and Don’ts there is indeed a lot of excitement in the air for execution and planning. But sadly, there’s a big hitch that the girls were not aware of. Their society is cancelling the playing of Holi with colours to conserve water. Crestfallen, the girls are mighty upset. Will all their hard work go to naught? Is there a better idea to still get to use their natural colours? What about the donation that they were thinking of giving? Will it be a success drive? Will Anand Society celebrate a different Holi?
The book is a part of the MinMini Reads series which presents chapter books that not only tell a good story but resonate with the lives of modern children.
The Best Idea of All by Varsha Seshan combines a familiar scenario with the feel of new-age childhood- where children want to reach beyond and make a difference to the world they live in at a very young age….all by themselves! And this deserves a salute!
