Penning down real life incidents

Techie-turned-author Suresh Ediga speaks about his debut book ‘You, Me & A Story’

Suresh Ediga recently released his first book, ‘You, Me & A Story’ and he states that he is enjoying the ease after letting off the creative twinge. Hailing from Hyderabad Suresh shifted his base to the US and worked there as a Software Professional since 16 years.

Sharing about his journey Suresh says, “I am an accidental storyteller. I give all the credit to my kids. The ritual of bedtime storytelling started almost eight years ago as a way to put my daughter to bed. Since the light was too distracting for her, I couldn’t read the books, so I had to weave my own stories.

My daughter, who is now 10, still insists I tell her a story before going to bed. My son, now four, also joined the bedtime storytelling camp. Although these stories started as my own, later these stories became a combined effort where, based on their inputs, I would weave the story and even I use to maintain my blog.”

About his book, Suresh said, “The book ‘You, Me & A Story’ is about 12 different stories, where each one of them has its own style of storytelling. This book is supposed to be a guide to the kids.”

“My first story is about ‘Bhopal gas tragedy’, which people have forgotten now – I am telling it in a child-friendly way and then there is a story about ‘Mallesham’, who he is a weaver, who was given the Padmashree award recently.

Then there is a story is about how the school is good for education but how life teaches the lessons. Mallesham who had very little formal education invented Laxmi Asu Machine to help his mother, who used to tediously weave for hours.

Mallesham could not see his mother suffering so much and he decided to make a machine, which not only helped his mother but the entire weaving community. Through my stories I want to engage the kids and make them aware of the world at an early age,” he adds.

What do you think makes a good story? “For me, storytelling is not a one-sided conversation, it should be a dialogue. Kids are very curious beings and they keep on asking questions, so my stories try to answer those questions and I keep them dialogue based to keep children engaged and it becomes a good story to tell.”

Suresh informs that parents have appreciated his efforts. “Parents are more than happy to gift this book to their wards. I am glad to say that the response has been very good so far from parents and they felt that my storytelling is very innovative. Even kids showered their appreciation upon me for this book.

The children really liked the illustrations the book. The other day, one kid sent me a message on WhatsApp saying “the best part in the book was the decoration and picture of the children playing in the garden”. So I feel that kids are able to relate to the story.”

Suresh is penning another book, which he hopes will be released in August. “The work is still in progress. This book is about issues which our farmers face. It is a collection of short stories and highlights the farming crisis in a slightly different way,” he signs off.