News & Review
Bookaroo debuts in Kohima
India’s most-loved and first Children Literature Festival, Bookaroo, is making its debut in North-East India at Kohima from October 25-27, 2018. The non-profit Bookaroo is co-organizing the event in partnership with The Kohima Institute, with support from the Government of Nagaland.
The proposed Children Literature Festival at Kohima is all set to bring together yet another selection of celebrated children’s authors, illustrators, poets, performers and storytellers from all corners of India. The festival is packed with interactive and hands-on activities that will be run by the literary stars themselves.
Some key speakers (children book writers) who will be in Kohima for the festival include:Amar Chitra Katha, India’s favourite comic book maker; Ameen ul Haque, storyteller extraordinaire from Bengaluru; Canato Jimo, illustrator and art director at Pratham Books; Parnab Mukherjee, a spoken word performer, curator, performance consultant and a leading alternative theatre director; Praba Ram, a children’s writer, a reading specialist and an early literacy advocate; Qissebaazi (a two-member storytelling team led by Saattvic – who works at a law firm, but moonlights as an actor, tabla player, playwright, singer, film-maker and storyteller – and Padma Damodaran, an actor, director, writer and theatre trainer who tells some marvellous tales for children); Rituparna Ghosh, a storyteller; Roopa Pai, author; Kavitha Mandana, a prolific writer and illustrator; and Rita Krocha, author and publisher.
The three-days Kohima Children Literature Festival engages children age group between from 4 to 14 years. It will have more than 40 sessions. The first day of the Festival is dedicated to authors visiting various schools (outreach). The second day is a packed session involving not only books alone but many other activities that engage the creativity of young minds. The last day of the literary fest is a day for families.
Smart wallpapers by Purple Turtle
Aadarsh, the children’s specialist publisher, has joined hands with Gratex, the Mumbai-based wall coverings manufacturer. With this alliance, Gratex launched a new collection of wallpapers featuring designs of Purple Turtle and Colour Fairies, suitable for children of all ages. The launch was presented at HGH Expo at Bombay Exhibition Centre.
The wallpapers are available in two variants—generic ‘Naturals’ with non-interactive cartoon prints, and their ‘Smart’ version with an accompanying app Scan Alive. The app allows users to scan the characters on the wall with a smart device to reveal interactive stories/rhymes on the tablet or smartphone.
“The characters are fun and exude an international appeal. Colour Fairies are liked by girls more while Purple Turtle is equally favourite with all,” said Manish Rajoria, Director, Aadarsh Pvt Ltd. “The vibrant colours and striking designs will not only brighten up kids’ rooms but also provide a stimulating environment for their developing minds.”
Featuring stunning digitally printed designs of animal characters in lush forest greens and magical land of Colour Fairies replete with blush pink among many soft hues, the wallpapers will be perfect focal point for kids’ rooms, nurseries and crèches. What makes this even more interesting is that each character in the smart wallpapers seems to come to life with the scanning app combo, encouraging fun family time by transforming storytelling/singalong experiences.
Gratex said that the new collections are aimed at “captivating every child’s imagination by providing top-quality wall coverings with kid-friendly characters.”
Purple Turtle and Colour Fairies—both are IPs of Aadarsh, known for their distinctive visuals and premium content for children. Purple Turtle has seen significant worldwide success since its inception in 2012 in Frankfurt Book Fair and has developed into a preschool brand with millions of new books published annually. Also, the IP has been successfully licensed to more than thirty countries including UK, UAE, China, Russia etc.
Education Edge to introduce Purple Turtle comic strips
Leading educational newspaper in Madhya Pradesh, Education Edge, has acquired the rights to publish Purple Turtle comic strips and activities, in a recent deal with Aadarsh Pvt Ltd, the licensor of the brand.
A suite of fun activities, puzzles and brain-teasers featuring Purple Turtle will be published for kids from 2nd to 9th standard. The content is aimed at promoting mental faculties of children by providing them a smarter and more enjoyable learning experience.
“Our association with Education Edge opens up yet another opportunity for us to reach more kids and families,” said Manish Rajoria, Director Aadarsh Pvt Ltd. “Purple Turtle is a gender-neutral character and its content is tailored to be age-appropriate and engaging for young audiences.”
“We are happy to be partnering with Aadarsh. This falls in our goals of constantly adding new and exciting content which will help stimulate kids’ inquisitiveness and develop thinking capabilities in them,” said Alpana Mishra, Editor of Education Edge.
Aadarsh has a history of successful content syndication partnership with various children’s magazines and publications like Go Getter–Inflight Magazine of Go Air Airlines, which has carried Purple Turtle puzzles, fact files, quizzes, comic strips and activities for children.
The Hindu Young World-Goodbooks Awards announced
The Hindu Young World-Goodbooks Awards 2018 for Indian children’s books is inviting entries for the next edition. The purpose of these awards is to promote excellence in children’s writing and illustration in India, to acknowledge innovative publishing trends, and to recognise children’s literature in India as an independent and important field.
Books published between January 1, 2017, and July 31, 2018, are eligible for entry. For the writing awards, translations, adaptations, anthologies by multiple writers, poetry books, activity books and comics are not eligible. An anthology by a single writer is eligible. For the illustration award, translated picture books are eligible, but activity books and comics are not.
Publishers can nominate a maximum of three books for each category. The books should reach them by September 15, 2018, along with the duly filled nomination form. Nomination forms can be downloaded from www.goodbooks.in.
Bonnier Publishing USA
presents Disney Bilingual Books!
Bonnier Publishing is partnering with Disney to release English-Spanish, English-French, and English-Mandarin bilingual books featuring beloved Disney charactersor three years. Board books, and leveled readers will be available as part of the new Disney Character Bilingual Books under the Bonnier licensing imprint BuzzPop.
Disney Princess Colores/Colors, and Disney Princess Números/Numbers are available now wherever books are sold. These will be followed by two bilingual English-Spanish movie storybooks for the films Moana and Coco.
BIBF opens International Children‘s Book Fair
The Beijing International Book Fair will open a dedicated Children’s Book Fair, to run concurrently with BIBF, from August 22-26, 2018 at the China International Exhibition Centre.
The idea for the Beijing International Children’s Book Fair (BICBF) came from the growing success of the children’s hall and rights trading section, which has always been the most active area of BIBF. It will bring together several areas including animation, comics, IP licensing, education and digital publishing to create a new type of cross-media professional exhibition. BICBF will also integrate publishing and other creative industry resources and content, to provide a comprehensive platform for cross-media rights trading, beyond books and into other forms of children’s entertainment.
The first BICBF will cover an area of 14,100 square meters and include exhibitors from China, Japan, South Korea, and France focusing on animation, film, and IP licensing.
It will also invite well-known cartoonists from China and overseas to visit the show to meet representatives from the industry.
The integration of film and television, multimedia, IP licensing, and publishing has been developing rapidly, and the new children’s fair will build a platform for publishing companies and these new potential business partners. The fair will also help publishers expand into new areas through professional forums, seminars and trade matchmaking activities.
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