AustLit

'The night before the Underwater Fancy Dress Parade, Alfie got that feeling...

Sometimes it's hard to be brave. Sometimes you get that feeling. Alfie isn't sure he can go to the parade, but his mum knows there's at least one special place for Alfie - a beautiful shimmery, underwater world that tells Alfie it's okay to feel shy. Because sometimes you're just not ready...until, one day, you are.' (Publication summary)

'Smart is not just ticks and crosses,
smart is building boats from boxes.
Painting patterns, wheeling wagons,
being mermaids, riding dragons …'

‘Every page of this book in joyous, imaginative and life-affirming … All the Ways to be Smart is a celebration of what childhood can be, and it will likely become a classic.’

Source: Publisher's blurb. 

Abandoned as a young child, Kalu, a cheeky street kid, has against all odds carved out a life for himself in rural India. In the quiet village of Hastinapore, Kalu makes friends: Bal, the solitary buffalo boy, and Malti, a gentle servant girl, who, with her mistress, Ganga Ba, has watched out for Kalu from the first day.

'Perched high in the branches of a banyan tree, Kalu chooses a leaf, rolls it tightly and, doing what he's done for as long as he can remember, blows through it. His pure simple notes dance through the air attracting a travelling healer whose interest will change Kalu's life forever, setting him on a path he would never have dreamed possible, testing his self-belief and his friendships.

'With all the energy and colour of India and its people, Dancing to the Flute is a magical, heart-warming story of this community's joys and sorrows, the nature of friendship and the astonishing transformative powers of music.' (From the publisher's website.)