Geometry, perspective, astronomy, and a healthy dose of curiosity all come together in this book. It tells the story of Usha, who’s learning to perform cartwheels, as she has a conversation with her big sister Aarti about a constellation they see in the sky.

Aarti explains, from their vantage point lying flat on the ground, that they’re looking at the Big Dipper, so named for its shape. Young Usha, with her love of trucks and tumbling, only sees a big digger instead. Both sisters squabble about it and continue the conversation when their cousin Gloria comes to visit. While Aarti and Usha are both sure that Gloria sees what they do, she surprises them by telling them she sees… a big kite!

Usha is upset that no one views the sky in the same way that she does. While her sisters cartwheel away, she’s left trying. When she lands on the ground after finishing up a cartwheel, Usha is surprised to see that she is able to spot the Big Dipper after all. She tries again, and there’s the kite that Gloria saw. What does Usha see next?

With illustrator Sandhya Prabhat’s trademark visual style of inky blues, purple hues, and beautifully artistic details such as with the engraved toys, the depictions of childhood sparring, affection, warmth, and abandon leap off the page, bound to strike a chord with Indian readers anywhere.

Writer Amita Jagannath Knight notes at the end of the book that the story is culturally rooted in the idea that different civilisations make up a variety of meanings to make sense of the patterns in the sky. She adds that the characters in the book explore rotation, orientation, perspective, as well as other geometric and spatial concepts, for young children with strong spatial skills do better at Math and Science in school.

Usha and the Big Digger
Written by Amita Jagannath Knight
Illustrated by Sandhya Prabhat
ISBN: 9781623542016
Publisher: Charlesbridge Publishing

You can buy a copy here* or find it at a library.

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Karthika Gopalakrishnan is the Head of Reading at Neev Academy, Bangalore, and the Director of the Neev Literature Festival. In the past, she has worked as a children’s book writer, editor, and content curator at Multistory Learning which ran a reading program for schools across south India. Prior to this, Karthika was a full-time print journalist with two national dailies. Her Twitter handle is g_karthika.