#471 - Smartypants Series Continues

by Anushka Ravishankar and illustrated by Pia Alizé Hazarika

“Smartypants Series” by Anushka Ravishankar and illustrated by Pia Alizé Hazarika. Published by Duckbill. The second part of a delightful series consisting of three books which explain interesting science concepts to a super smart and curious cat called Smartypants.

The second instalment of the series has three books - “Earthquakes For Smartypants”, “Newton’s Laws of Motion For Smartypants” and “Vaccines For Smartypants”. Each of these books features an extremely curious cat called Smartypants who is trying to understand interesting concepts and has quite a few questions lined up. His amusing antics and witty remarks (though self proclaimed by him) are delightful. The narrative is directed towards Smartypants and it is fun to see him being playful while trying to understand what is being told to him. More often than not, his imagination runs wild and he thinks of funny things before being dragged back to reality by the narrator :)

Each of the topics have been explained well in a simple and understandable manner for the children with humour and word fun in an extremely enjoyable way. After all the author is Anushka Ravishankar who is well known in Indian children’s literature community for her humorous writing! The illustrations are quirky and charming adding that zing to the reading experience. Read these charming books to know concepts of force, acceleration, parts of earth, tectonic plates, antibodies, T cells and many more.

This series has been well enjoyed by my nine year old son before. We were excited when we got to know about the new set of books this time. And the topics were something that sounded very interesting for him and made him curious to know more about. He enjoyed reading each of the books. He had a grin on his face each time Smartypants was gently rebuked or frowned upon for his remarks or playfulness. The whole scenario was so relatable for him ;) The illustrations are a treat for the eyes and we had fun looking at the different expressions of Smartypants as he figured out what was being told to him. My son had seen a selfie of the author and her cat along with the pictures of the books posted by the editor on social media. He was amused to see the real Smartypants and just couldn’t get over his expression in the photograph :)

The series is a beautiful means to explain some of the basic concepts of important topics in such an engaging manner. I was actually intrigued when I saw Newton’s laws of Motion as one of the topics. We learnt it in high school and how were younger children going to understand is what I was thinking. But I was amazed at what I saw in the book and how my nine year old seemed to have understood it without much effort. This just shows how topics can be made interesting for children to learn them.

Recommended Age

The books are apt for children aged 6 and above.

Disclaimer - We received these books from the publisher, Penguin India (Duckbill), for review. Thank you to Mansi, from Penguin, for sending across the books!