Source : The New Indian Express
This is not the first time animal rights activist and politician Maneka Gandhi has written a book for children but the reason why she wrote her new book There’s a Monster under my bed is rather cute.
This is not the first time animal rights activist and politician Maneka Gandhi has written a book for children but the reason why she wrote her new book There’s a Monster under my bed is rather cute.
A conversation with her four-year-old grand-daughter Anasuya, who dreaded the idea of having a demon under her bed every night, was the reason why Gandhi chose to pen a book on one of the most common childhood fears and puncture them with imaginative assurances.
The book, priced Rs 399 and published by Penguin, has just hit the stands.
“We tend to think of childhood as a happy-happy period of life without any worries but it’s just not true,” says Gandhi, who is the Union Women and Child Development Minister.
“Most parents tend to ignore the fear young children have and often dismiss them thinking that kids will grow out of it but these fears need to be dealt with. Quite often, the fear kids have in their minds transmutes into another kind of fear as they grow up,” adds Gandhi, 62, who herself as a child was frightened of being separated from her parents.
Gandhi says that she, in her childhood, was almost “paralysed” with this fear but sadly it was never addressed.
The idea behind the book has been to nudge parents into talking their children out of their own mental demons and embrace them in an imaginative ways. From darkness to being left behind at school forever to doctors’ injections, the book, which is decorated with elaborated illustrations, has inventive answers to 20 fears and scary experiences children under five have.
Gandhi, who loves spending time with her grand-daughter, who has keen interest in nature, is already working on a new book for kids.
