A Gift for Amma: Market Day in India

by Meera Sriram (Author) Mariona Cabassa (Illustrator)

A Gift for Amma: Market Day in India
Reading Level: K − 1st Grade
A young girl explores the vibrant rainbow of items for sale in a southern Indian street market as she searches for a gift for her mother. Includes facts about the items mentioned and markets around the world, as well as photographs taken by the author in her hometown of Chennai, India.
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School Library Journal

PreS-Gr 1--It's market day in India and a young girl is on a mission to find the perfect gift for Amma, her mother. Navigating the market on her own, the girl travels from one stall to the next, examining each item for sale. From rich spices to aromatic flowers to vibrant textiles, the options seem endless. How will the girl find the ideal prize? Luckily, one stall catches the girl's attention, and she returns home with a gift as lovely as Amma herself. This heartwarming story about a little girl choosing to give her mother something special showcases depth and richness of color on every page. Emphasizing the look and feel of a traditional Indian market, Cabassa's illustrations are deeply pigmented, prioritizing specific hues on each spread. While the visual component of this book is captivating on its own, the text enhances the images by adding details about the sounds and smells of the market. Though presented in two short lines per page, the brevity of text nevertheless manages to tell a robust story. At the end of the book, readers find images and definitions of the capitalized words in the text. An additional page introduces readers to different markets around the world and provides interesting facts about them. VERDICT An excellent story for young readers to enhance their understanding of color and an aspect of traditional Indian culture.--Mary Lanni, formerly at Denver P.L.

Copyright 2020 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
Meera Sriram
Meera Sriram grew up in India and moved to the U.S. at the turn of the millennium. She is the author of several picture books, including A Garden in My Hands and A Gift for Amma, which School Library Journal called an "excellent story for young readers to enhance their understanding of color and an aspect of traditional Indian culture" in a starred review. An electrical engineer in her past life, she now enjoys writing for children and advocating for early and multicultural literacy. Meera loves yoga and chai, and lives with her husband and two children in Berkeley, California.

Sandhya Prabhat is an independent animator and illustrator based in the Bay Area, California, who hails from Chennai, India. She holds an MFA degree in animation and digital arts from NYU Tisch School of the Arts Asia and a bachelor's degree in literature from Stella Maris College. She has illustrated several picture books for independent publishers, including I Am Brown and Today I Am.
Classification
Fiction
ISBN-13
9781646860623
Lexile Measure
-
Guided Reading Level
-
Publisher
Barefoot Books
Publication date
August 21, 2020
Series
-
BISAC categories
JUV013060 - Juvenile Fiction | Family | Parents
JUV014000 - Juvenile Fiction | Girls & Women
JUV030020 - Juvenile Fiction | People & Places | Asia
Library of Congress categories
Picture books
India
Markets

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