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Shoo, Crow! (Hook Books): It’s not a book, it’s a hook!

The crows of Rajipuram are eating up all the corn in the fields. Can Velu and Akif find a way to shoo them away?

About the Hook Book Series

In a world where children’s books often feel cut from the same cloth, Hook Books stand out as a vibrant blend of imagination, humour, and heart. Crafted as a bridge between picture books and early chapter books, this series delivers stories that spark joy and wonder, while remaining rooted in age-appropriate learning.

Hook Books keep the fun going with:

  • Short, digestible bits of text (perfect for budding readers)
  • Bright colour illustrations that pull kids into the story
  • Themes that speak to the everyday lives of children—plus a sprinkle of whimsy!

From fantasy tales to those that touch on more advanced ideas, Hook Books ensure that young readers are always in for a treat, no matter their reading level. Even better, these books take children on journeys through different parts of India, giving them a taste of the rich diversity of our world through local flavours, landscapes, and cultures. Whether the story takes place in bustling cities or quiet villages, Hook Books make every setting feel like home.

Looking for the Rainbow

Winner of the Crossword Book Award for Children’s Writing

First ever great autobiography series for children, an absolutely essential read for young Ruskin Bond fans


An illustrated book for young readers (ages 9 and up) to help build comprehension and imagination

At age eight, Ruskin escapes his jail-like boarding school in the hills and goes to live with his father in Delhi. His time in the capital is filled with books, visits to the cinema, music and walks and conversations with his father-a dream life for a curious and wildly imaginative boy, which turns tragic all too soon.

For years, Ruskin Bond has regaled and mesmerized readers with his tales. In Looking for the Rainbow, Bond travels to his own past, recalling his favourite adventures (and misadventures) with extraordinary charm, splotches of wit, a pinch of poignance and not a trace of bitterness.

What you’re holding, dear reader, is a classic in the making.

All-Time Favourites for Children

A keepsake edition with 25 stories.
Beautiful illustrations accompanying the stories make it a fun read
Engages middle-school students–an essential book to be stocked in libraries
A collection of Ruskin Bond’s best stories with endearing characters–hand-picked by the author himself.

All Time Favourites for Children celebrates Ruskin Bond’s writing with stories that are perennially loved and can now be enjoyed in a single collectible volume. Curated and selected by India’s most loved writer, this collection brings some of the evocative episodes from Ruskin’s life, iconic Rusty, eccentric Uncle Ken, ubiquitous grandmother, and many other charming, endearing characters in a single volume while also introducing us to a smattering of new ones that are sure to be firm favourites with young readers. Heart-warming, funny and spirited, this is a must-have on every bookshelf!

Fighter Cock

A desolate land.
A debauched patriarch.
An upstart in search of a reputation.
A man running away from one.

Shikargarh, central India. An untamed wilderness ruled by a dissolute raja with a passion for sex, drugs and cockfighting. The raja’s Karianath fighter cocks are the undisputed champions of the area – but their reign is challenged by the new Aseel fighters imported by Teja, his bastard son, who also schemes to usurp his position.
Into this world arrives Sheru, a brooding stranger hired to work for the raja. As Sheru negotiates this wild land, he finds himself getting pulled into a deadly vortex of events that threaten to derail his destiny. But Sheru is a dangerous man with a dark past, and when he unleashes his fury, all hell breaks loose.

Nyagrodha

As their train puffs away into the distance, three runaway children, Lily, Vicky and Aman, are led by Makhmal Khan the monkey into the shimmering world of the forest. . . Deep within its shadows, beyond the last cloud on the horizon, stands Nyagrodha, the ancient banyan. Within its magical labyrinth the children encounter monarchs and mice, dreamers and scholars, paupers and fortune-seekers, braggarts and burglars, foppish fish and bloodsucking bugs, gory battles and incredible flying machines. But none of these can distract them from the dangers that threaten Simha, the fierce young king and his friend Jeev, the musical bull. For the story of their tangled lives is very like the childrens’ own. Will Aman, Vicky and Lily find their way back home through the maze of stories? Or will treachery destroy the friendship between Simha and Jeev, and leave the forest wounded and bleeding forever. ‘This is an upside-down story,’ Hanumanta the Langoor warns the children. ‘A story that will turn you inside out. Will you hear it unafraid?’

A Rulebreakers’ Club Adventure

Who’ll let the dog out?

The Rulebreakers’ Club is a gang of five that’s stuck with the Worst Dog in the World. But they’ve finally found a way to get rid of him. All they have to do is catch a ghost and rob a bank. Oh, and they also have to save the world. Easy, right? Wrong! How are the Rulebreakers ever going to get out of the mess they’ve got themselves into? And where will they find this phantom ghost?

A Rulebreakers’ Club Adventure

Three boys, two girls and one dog-no, you haven’t heard this before!

The Rulebreakers’ Club is a gang of five without a dog. And, of course, gangs without dogs are just not cool. They decide to remedy this situation by kidnapping a pug named Spike. But dognapping is tricky business and dog-owning is definitely not as easy as it sounds. Can the Rulebreakers survive this trouble-making dog and save the world while they’re at it? Or will they land up in a doggone mess?

The House That Spoke

Fourteen-year-old Zoon Razdan is witty, intelligent and deeply perceptive. She also has a deep connection with magic. She was born into it. The house that she lives in is fantastical-life thrums through its wooden walls-and she can talk to everything in it, from the armchair and the fireplace to the books, pipes and portraits! But Zoon doesn’t know that her beloved house once contained a terrible force of darkness that was accidentally let out by one of its previous owners. And when the darkness returns, more powerful and malevolent than ever, it is up to her to take her rightful place as the Guardian of the house and subsequently, Kashmir.

The Goofies Tear Down Their House

The crazy adventures of a madcap family!

The ever-in-a-hurry Goofies need to renovate their house. And of course, the only one who agrees to take up the job is none but the slowest handyman around town, Mr Workslow. But he’s yet to arrive and the Goofies can’t wait to get started. So after much heaving, out come all their worldly goods in a battered and mangled heap of wood, cloth, metal, plastic, glass . . . err . . . yeah, they’re definitely going to need new furniture.

And unknown to the nutty family, stashed in their dump yard from hell is the extravagant loot of Petersville’s unwelcome visitors-a gang of hapless thieves! Yeah, they are going to need some reinforcements, too, if they hope to bumble their way out of this mess.

Bim and the Town of Falling Fruit

In Poondy, fruits are always falling on people’s heads-from the jackfruit, coconut and toddy trees-causing many injuries. So all the Poondizens wear fruit-helmets invented by the legendary Falwala. Bim loves Poondy, with its falling fruits, its Wise Man and its barber-detective.

Then one day, Miss Chitty, Bim’s mother, who drives a coffee-coloured taxi, decides to move away from Poondy. Bim’s last two weeks in his home town are full of strange and exciting adventures-from a bat attack to a bike theft-that can only happen here!

Arjun Talwar’s debut novel is a mad and hilarious romp through a town filled with eccentric people. It is brought to vivid life by Shilpa Ranade’s beautiful illustrations.

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