Book Name: Dear Author, You Are Wrong
Author: Varsha Varghese
Illustrated By: Aditi Aggarwal
Publisher: Scholastic India
Type: Paperback
Length: 126 pages
Recommended Age: 10 years onwards
Dear Author, You Are Wrong by Varsha Varghese is a well-meaning middle-grade novel that, for the most part, earns its ambitions.
Eleven-year-old Avisha reads a book from her summer reading list and takes an immediate dislike to the motivations and actions of its protagonist. Her neighbour Madhu Aunty — practically extended family — sees it differently. It’s the kind of disagreement that might have ended there, except Avisha isn’t quite ready to let it go. She decides to write to the author directly, to make her case, to say: you are wrong.
She, unexpectedly, receives a reply. This sets off an unlikely correspondence that begins to challenge her own beliefs. Now that the book is being adapted into a web series, Avisha decides to help the author investigate: have things really changed since the book was written? It’s a premise that works well, and I found myself genuinely curious to see where both threads were heading.
Under the guise of this research, the book raises questions that feel real and immediate — why must delivery people use a separate lift in her apartment complex? Do families have clear gender roles? Is a gender role wrong in itself? What I appreciated was that these weren’t treated as abstract issues. The subplot with Avisha’s friend — a boy pushed toward boxing because his family expects it, even though he wants nothing to do with it — gives the gender conversation a dimension that extends that same curiosity to boys.
There are moments, though, where the messaging sits a little close to the surface — where you sense the author’s intentions just slightly ahead of the story itself. Fortunately Avisha’s ridiculous disguises, her self importance and plans she hasn’t really thought through offer a good balance.
Scholastic Asian Book Award (SABA) Winner 2023, Dear Author, You Are Wrong is a thoughtful, socially conscious read. It knows that in reality, there are no neat answers. And it does not claim them either.
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CLICK & BUY NOW!Disclaimer: Mandira is part of the #kbcReviewerSquad and received this book as a review copy from the publisher via kbc. She is the author of the award winning book Children of the Hidden Land. Her new release Muniya’s Quest for middle graders has been reviewed here with high praise and lots of love!
