a day ago
- Entertainment
- New Indian Express
Wishing on a Star: Vinita Singh Shetty's debut kids' book tells a story of hope and cosmic wonder
On her seventh birthday, Reyah asks the Sun and the Moon to make her wish come true. Unlike most kids who wish for toys or treats, Reyah's wish is for her one-year-old brother, Neil, who has a hearing disability, to be able to 'hear the beautiful sounds I can hear'. 'I don't know who is more important among you two, but whoever it is, please make my wish come true,' she declares.
This is the premise of Vinita Singh Shetty's debut children's book, Reyah and the Cosmic Wish (Westland Books; `199), which explores themes of hope, universal balance, kindness, and more.
The book emerged from the stories Shetty would make up for her daughter Annika and retell to her group of friends, helping her gauge which ones worked best. 'Every time I told her a story, if I repeated it with some variation, she would point it out. Eventually, she said, 'Can you please write it down so you don't keep changing things',' explains Shetty with a laugh, adding, 'I found her friends coming back and asking for particular stories often. This was one of the stories that seemed to resonate the most.'
Shetty's decision to include a differently abled character was with the intention to encourage empathy in children. 'For a child whose sensory perceptions are so high, to have somebody at home who doesn't have that – as a child, you don't know what it is or how it's going to get better. I didn't start off thinking about how I can make the story inclusive but about how I can bring about kindness and empathy from a child without being too preachy.'
