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Customized eBooks and a Look at Children's Publishing in IndiaWho can forget those bedtime stories that Grandmother told? Or the sheer bliss of a Saturday afternoon spent amongst the pages of a library book while rain pattered on the panes and we followed teen heroes or heroines on a quest? Children’s books largely fall into three categories: tales from the epics or classics, creative fiction and non-fiction, such as historic tales, biographies or general knowledge books. Children’s publishing in India, if we leave aside the oral storytelling tradition, started with the entry of publishing houses such as the Children’s Book Trust, National Book Trust, India Book House and Thompson Press in the early fifties. Most books were translations of local folk tales, classics or epics and seen by Indian parents as aids to better vocabulary or as culturally relevant. A number of Western classics, abridged or otherwise, were prescribed reading at school. Reading for pleasure was more or less marked by the beloved Famous Five or William kind of books. Or there was always the choice of reading books essentially written for adults. Writers in local languages also came up with delightfully entertaining books that were sometimes confined to local audiences – Satyajit Ray’s or Rabindranath Tagore’s books for children, for instance. However, the illustrations and print quality left much to be desired. The editing, too, was not of the best standards. As with Oliver Twist, young readers were left wanting more. Some of the older publishing houses, such as Orient Longman’s, Macmillan, Penguin, Navneet and Frank Brothers, are now concentrating on children’s literature. With the advent of Scholastic, Dorling Kindersley, Disney and a host of multinationals all seeking a slice of the Indian pie, children’s publishing is all set to come into its own. A number of small independent publishing houses such as Katha, Tulika Publishers, Young Zubaan and Tara have a novel approach to children’s literature. The trend is towards illustrated books and audio books, such as the popular Karadi Tales for young children, and creative fiction, such as adventure stories and science fiction for older children. eBooks are fast catching up as an inexpensive and online option for the modern child hooked on to the Internet. The presence of Amazon and Barnes & Noble in retailing eBooks is well known, and Google is set to join the fray. A number of websites offer customization and personalization of kids’ stories, but the concept is new in India and needs to catch on. Websites such as www.iandmystory.com and Kolkata-based “My Personalized Mall” are the lone rangers at the moment. According to the conference held by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) at Chennai, e-publishing in India is expected to grow into a 1.46 billion USD market by 2010. Children’s publishing will undoubtedly be a part of this. eBooks for children can overcome the limitations of the print medium by offering better illustrations, typesetting and even audio at a lower price. Chillibreeze, with proven expertise that spans eBooks on expat guides to novels and literature, has produced a comic book on malaria and illustrated eBooks for children. Some negatives to keep in mind are that most of the prominent publishing houses report that only 1% of their total sales are made up by the sale of eBooks. However, an overall worldwide market of 100 million USD is not to be scoffed at. Penguin and Scholastic are going in for e-publishing in Asia in a big way. Scholastic is looking at utilising digital media to reach about 5000 schools, according to the President of Scholastic Asia, Mr. Frank Wong. In India, Penguin is expecting audio books and eBooks to make up 2% of the book market in the next five years. The overall book market in India, excluding textbooks, is pegged at Rs 2,000 crore and is estimated to have a 15% growth every year. Know more about publishing your child's work
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