Book Review: Tales To Tell

Book Blurb: 

While one story glorifies the bravery of men we tend to ignore, the other speaks of our dreams and fear of demons and death. A funny tale of a lost professor, an emotional tale of bonding with grandparents, a tale of revenge for a death, a story of paper and pen, "Tales-To-Tell" celebrates life as we know if in just 500 words. In today's world when we are slowly and steadily moving towards everything short and crisp, Kolkata Bloggers and BEE Books joined hands to launch a book of short stories with illustrations. 

20 short story tellers and 20 illustrators have come together for the first time to bring a collection of short stories. Hope you enjoy reading it as much as we did making it. 

Anirban Saha
(Founder, Kolkata Bloggers)

Esha Chatterjee
(CEO: BEE Books) 

Book Details:

Publisher: BEE Books

ISBN-10:  938092528X

Edition:   1

Number of Pages:  120

Publication Year: 2015

Language:  English

ISBN-13:  9789380925288

Binding:  Paperback

Price: Rs 80 (I got mine as review copy)

Book Link: Flipkart 

The Review: 

One would think that reading an anthology of 20 short stories would take a lot longer than just a couple of hours (even with the blurb warning you that each story is no more than 500 words). Once you finish reading the book; you'd be left wondering about each of the short stories and look again into each of the illustrations...because suddenly you can see the details you'd missed out before reading the story. 

I have never reviewed an anthology before and while I know that it's the norm to review each of the stories - it is difficult to review the 20 stories indivually and not reveal what the stories are about. Therefore I choose to write about the anthology as a whole. It is the surprise and the mixed genre of stories that makes "Tales-To-Tell" a truly unique read. 

Yes, the book might have a few typographical errors but one should remember that the book was made by humans. As humans, we are all allowed to make mistakes. (Remember J.K. Rowling's epic mistake in The Goblet of Fire? When Harry and Voldemort's wand connected, it was supposed to bring back echoes of all those who Voldemort had killed in reverse order. Therefore, Harry's mother should have emerged before his father did. But in the first print, she made the mistake. However, that being J.K.Rowling's mistake fans got excited that there might be an epic plot twist. In subsequent editions, Rowling made that changes and accepted that it was a 'human mistake'.) 

The stories featured in Tales to Tell were chosen through a competition that had been announced back on 16th January 2015. And I have to say the winners truly deserved it. The judges did a good job picking diverse tales: and not one tales is like the other. 

I am looking forward to the next edition of Tales To Tell. Till then, pick up a copy of the book and read what tales the talented young minds have come up with. You will not regret it! Happy Reading.

RATING:

P.S. - I got the two masterminds behind Tales To Tell to agree to an interview. Keep an eye on the sister blog Aniesha's Musings for the same.