Storybook Favorites

One of the first storybooks I looked at was CSI: Indian Epics, and I have always enjoyed crime dramas, so the title caught my eye. The project had a wonderful kind of hard-boiled style. From the introduction, we're left to assume that the protagonist has died, and all the information the reader has is a diary that they left. It followed a character who was looking to solve the murder of his grandfather, Bhishma. Along the way, he examines the deaths of Drona and Karna. In the end, he uses information from all three deaths to piece together what happened. The whole thing was written in the style of a detective's diary with detailed reports covering each incident. I think the introduction itself was a good example telling a story with limited information. The whole thing leaves the reader a little lost and confused but still able to follow along, which to me, is ideally how this kind of story should feel. I particularly enjoyed the storytelling style. Each of the stories was told almost in reverse using details from the "crime scene" to pull together what had happened.

classic hard-boiled detective
I pulled this from an interesting article on derivative works

The next storybook that caught my eye was Onboard the Spaceship Pushpaka.This project had a really interesting premise. It looked at four planets named after animal avatars of Vishnu. They had me at space and interstellar travel, but there's also an interesting story wrapping the whole premise. The story follows a young crew member of the Pushpaka named Milo as he gets to know the rest of the crew during a voyage through space. The legends behind each of the avatars are recanted by the Pushpaka's captain. Although the Pushpaka and it's crew are mostly a means to tell the legends, they are actually quite interesting characters, and they end up having a compelling story of their own.

The third project I found interesting was Player One vs. MAYA. This storybook is presented in the "choose your own adventure" style where the reader takes on the role of one of the main characters and makes choices affecting the outcome of the story. The reader takes on the role of Rama during his adventures within the Ramayana in parts one and two. Then, in part three, they take the role of Uttanka as he meets Krishna and is granted immortality. The main twist to the stories is that Maya is the narrator, and he has changed the stories slightly from their original versions. Although I'm not particularly familiar with the original stories yet, I thought this was a wonderful idea, and it made for an interesting and fun adventure.