If the 20th century can be called the era of industrial revolution, the 21st century surely carries its repercussions. Environmental concerns cannot be shrugged off under the rug anymore, and we need to have an honest dialogue regarding it. One of the best ways to do this is to educate younger generation. Rajat Chaudhuri in Wonder Tales For A Warming Planet has done the same by collating three short stories and making them interactive with illustrations by Isha Nagar.
Things often might not be what they seem to be, and that theme has been carefully captured in the short story Tina and the Light of the World. In the imaginary land of Malegnea, Tina is surrounded by loneliness as many homes are regularly lost to the rising Big Water. Subsequently, she ventures on a magical journey which turns out to be something unexpected. What comes next is a quest to save herself and the lessons that she learns in her journey. The Seventh Sense, on the other hand, is the story of a young boy named Gogol and his dear friends, who happen to be trees. His father, a real estate tycoon Richard Roy, has a new city plan, for which Gogol has to bid his tree friends farewell.
However, Gogol aims at fighting for his friends even if that means standing up to his father. The last story, How Did the Ocean Vanish? takes a different route in a world filled with xerophytes and cacti, with a character named Ouma narrating a story to her offspring about how their world used to be filled with water and how they lost it all. The story then goes into a struggle of survival and failure, leading to the wide-scale destruction.
Initiating a conversation as vast and complex as environmental issues, especially to the younger generation, is an insurmountable task, as it demands revealing dark truths regarding corporate greed and human interference in the ecology. Even as many parents see education solely as a tool to get employment, we are slowly realising that it is equally important to create responsible human beings. The book is an attempt in the same direction, conveying genuine concerns in a way best suited for young readers.
Chaudhuri has devised a thoughtful tool by using the introduction to lay the ground for the issues that he has discussed in the book and then carefully amalgamating them with fantastical stories. He ends the stories with a brief explanation of the underlying issues just to reaffirm their importance. The book ends with activities for the reader to put them into action. The author not only has skillfully included aspects of climate change and deforestation into the stories but has also carefully limited their approach to not become too preachy. The illustrations make it even more appealing and engaging for the readers.