The year is almost over and as I scan my timeline for 2015 on social media and at the blogs I wrote this year – I must admit it has been a full year in more ways than one.

2015 started with a bang. Anansi’s New Web was accepted by OUP Pakistan after a long wait. The story had taken 7 years from creation to acceptance and the news came on New Year’s Day. Read about it here.

Mid-January is Harvest festival in India and Farmer Falgu visited many homes during this festive period. Watch this space in 2016 for a story about how such celebrations led to Farmer Falgu – Book 4.

 

Recommended by the eminent Jan Blake, CLPE invited me to tell stories in February. I had a blast telling stories from India to children from various schools. Look at the photos here.

2015 was my first World Book Day as an author. I did a whopping 17 school visits in 6 weeks – across many parts of England. I told stories, made up stories with the children and introduced Farmer Falgu and Veera to many children. Some glimpses captured on camera here.

Clever Camel (illustrated by Eugene Ruble) was published by Guardian Angel Publishing in July. Cheeky camel did a round of visits in Bexley and Slade Green community libraries in the summer.

I visited two libraries and a school in India via Skype this year. Miraculously the technology worked and we had roaring fun. The stories that we created during such sessions are available to read here.

Farmer Falgu and I also managed a Google Hangout session with 3 homes directly connected to me and we read the stories with the parents and children. Technology here was a bit on the rough side – something to work out for 2016. Find out more about our tele-story sessions here.

2015 also marked new milestones for Farmer Falgu. He got his passport stamped in France and Japan. Find out more about these books here. The story of Farmer Falgu’s journey across continents is told here.

2015 also saw signing of new contracts for a number of books.

I signed with Walker Books for a second title to tell more stories about Veera and Suku, which is due out in 2016. Watch this space.

Farmer Falgu 3&4 are also in the making and hopefully available to buy in 2016 as well. Karadi Tales also commissioned a new title Varsha’s Varanasi (illustrated by Soumitra Ranade) which is in final stages of production now and due to be out in 2016 as well.

Scholastic India signed me up for 3 titles of reading and activity book based on my favourite Panchatantra stories (illustrated by Nimisha Saikia). Those would be out in 2016 as well. Find out more about this here.

To top it all my first picture book in the UK – Pattan’s Pumpkin was commissioned, illustrated and ready for Frankfurt Book Fair in 2015. The amazing Frane Lessac and I hit it off big time and we are hoping to have a blast with Otter-Barry Books. Expect some Indian pumpkin recipes too to mark the book’s release.

I must also reveal to those who don’t know already that I finally took the plunge and signed up to do my Masters in Writing for Young People at Bath Spa University. With the first module under my belt, I am excited to be on this journey to push the boundaries of my writing, discover my strengths and fix my weaknesses. I have amazing tutors and fabulous classmates and this is a dream come true in so many ways. Yes it is tough to juggle life with work and writing and a Masters degree. But that’s the joy of it – life is full of happy challenges, and no minute is wasted.

I should also mention that before my Masters started, I snuck in a short course of writing poetry for children with Roger McGough and Rachel Rooney at Arvon. What a fab week it was.

In 2015 I also visited three other schools in the second part of the year – each one different and fun in so many ways. From down the road in Shadwell to all the way in Lancashire (thinking of everyone there during the floods), I met with so many kids and brought Farmer Falgu and Gola and Balu to them from faraway India.

Through the year, I have become more conscious of diversity in children’s publishing in the UK, discussed Indian books in detail with various professionals in India and finding my voice as a BAME writer (or should I say a writer from multiple heritages). Read some of those interviews here. As part of this conscious effort, I also created a list of South Asian books for children – Saffron Stories.

In 2015 I launched the Kids Zone site for all things kids – activities, puzzles, recipes – all based on my books. All resources are free. Get them here.

Now it is nearing 2016. It’s been a busy year – writing, discovering, learning, teaching, travelling and meeting friends. I have made new friends and renewed connections with many old friends. I often think of myself as the people collector and I am glad my collection has grown both on Facebook and in real life.

I travelled with my parents to 6 towns in South India to discover the places my father lived as a boy and some places I lived as a child.

And with all this going on – I have read over 50 books this year and I still haven’t dented my ever-toppling tower of books to read.

In the last week of 2015, here I am in India, committed for two more events. I visited my favourite haunt in Chennai – Just Books Anna Nagar (27^th December) to do a talk and sign books. It was a roaring success (even if I say so myself). I am reading a book to Karadi Tales team on the 31^st December – a perfect round-off for a perfect year.

What would 2016 bring? What am I wishing for?

Well the list is long as usual and this is just for my writing life. My wish-list is usually my to-do list too – I believe in making things happen on my own. However there are some things only luck and fate can bring. So I have one wish for Santa (right at the end….)

• I want more time to read the ever-toppling mountain of amazing books.
• Of course more time to write and experiment with words and stories.
• I want to take the time to fill the well – be inspired, be open to experiences of all sorts and let loose my imagination.
• My MA would be in full swing and I would start on my final manuscript. I could use all the help and energy I can get to make this the best it could be.

And Santa if you’re listening, I wish for an Amazing Agent who would take me on and believe in me as a writer, so that I could write full-time.

I wish every one of you – friends – writers and illustrators, editors and publishers, readers, parents of readers, librarians, teachers – A WONDERFUL NEW YEAR!