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Book Review: Matsya: The First Avatar by Sundari Venkatraman

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Book Review: Matsya: The First Avatar by Sundari Venkatraman

New book series by Author Sundari Venkatraman has captured reader's attention. This time its not a Romance genre instead its a Mythology based retelling of the Dashavatar in Sundari's words. My 5yr old kid is loving the entire series. Matsya is the Book 1 of the series. Sundari is already writing the 5th Book, so lets hurry up.

Know about the book: Spotlight: Matsya: The First Avatar by Sundari Venkatraman

Story:
The book explains the 4 Yugas and how at the end of the last Yuga, the Asura Hayagriva manages to get hold of the 4 Vedas. Lord Vishnu being the Preserver promises Lord Brahma that he will get the Vedas back in time. He takes the form of fish or Matsya and enlists the help of King Satyavrath to help him.
How can a fish defeat an Asura? How will King Satyavrath help Lord Vishnu?
Buy the Book:

What I Liked:
I am more of a fiction story reader. I am guilty of not being able to recite to my kids mythological stories. I used to be at a loss of words to explain what a demon or Asura is, who is God, difference in God & demon, violence, devotion, the meaning behind the rituals we do, explanation of the shlokas, etc.
When Sundari published Book 1 I was hesitant to read it myself forget reading aloud to my kid. But once I started reading it, we both were immersed in the story. It is a 38 pages book and however small time slots I tried to give for reading the book, we always exceeded it.

The cover is so rich and gets the reader to visualise the story more easily.

The language is simple. Emotions are Sundari's forte and here too she makes the reader quiver, laugh, get anxious, feel the dread so much that my kid cowered when it came to destroying the Asura.

The retelling is smooth and easy. Perfect for kids and adults keen to know more about the story.

I loved how small small stories are interwoven without stepping away from the main story and that too in the shortest possible way.

Hats off to the research Sundari must have put in this to make it so simple to read and understand for us. It brought about a hosts of questions from my kid and I tried my best to answer them.
Thank you for making me & my kids a team in reading this series.

What I wanted more:
Its a retelling of the story in simple words. I doubt there was a lack of anything.

We have started reading Book 2, so let you know how that goes too in few days ;)

I now cant list all the books by Sundari Venkatraman we have reviewed on this blog, so please check
the Tag: Sundari Venkatraman ;)

Bye. Take care.

Comments

Mwah! Thank you Nilima & Pranav. I am so happy to know that he liked my story. And finally, Nilima, you will get to know more about Indian Mythology through my stories :D <3
Nilima Mohite said…
Welcome and that is the plan ! Waiting for more books and speeding up our reading aloud ;)