Uma Krishnaswami is one of the best and most distinguished author/mentors in the children’s publishing industry. I have enjoyed the Book Uncle trilogy so much and feel honored to welcome her to discuss the third book in the series.
Your forthcoming book, The Sunshine Project (Groundwood Books, 2025), is the third book in the “Book Uncle” trilogy. What was your inspiration for this story?
Book Uncle and Me was first published in 2012 by Scholastic India, and I didn’t intend to write a sequel.
The idea for book 2, Birds on the Brain (Groundwood Books, 2024), came from a third-grader at a virtual talk I did during the COVID-19 pandemic. I joked about it at the time, but after that session was over, it wouldn’t leave me alone. If I’d known that was going to happen, I would absolutely have noted the child’s name and given her credit. But of course I didn’t know, because I never know if an idea will make it into final form.
Once I’d written Birds on the Brain, there had to be a third book in Anil’s voice. The story of the Sunshine Project came directly out of Anil’s character—his enthusiasm for solar energy, his reluctance to speak up. All I had to do was give him room on the page to be himself and the story opened up.
Book Uncle and Me was all about grassroots activism and the love of books. Birds On the Brain was about getting people interested in increasing bird count and urging the city government to support the effort. The Sunshine Project was about asking the right questions when the city decides to build a solar panel factory on the site of a mangrove forest, and planting a hundred and one mangrove seedlings. Everyday activism is a common theme in this trilogy. How did you go about choosing the different themes to portray social injustices and calls to action in the stories?
I didn’t. I never choose the themes of my stories. Perhaps they choose me. I decide on workaday things like how much fictional time has elapsed between scenes and chapters, and in this case between books in a trilogy. I figured The Sunshine Project took place soon after the events of Birds on the Brain, during the same school year, since they have the same classroom teacher. So it made sense that the solar panels Anil advocated for in Book 2 would now be installed and connected to the grid at the opening of Book 3.
The bully character, Mohan, was a total surprise, but there he was, on the bus, waiting to push Anil into action because—well, Anil needed a push and I couldn’t give it to him, so I had to invent someone who could. That in turn became a story about Anil’s needing to stand up for himself, and thus, by extension, stand up against a bigger wrong playing out in the community.
But if you’d stopped me after chapter 4 or 5 and asked me what the theme was—I think my self-doubting inner critic would have me curled up under the desk, refusing to write another word.
Themes, begone. I’m too busy listening to my characters.
What do you want readers to take away from The Sunshine Project?
That voices of young people matter. That they should pay attention to what’s going on in the world around them because that is going to tell them what kind of future world that they will be living in. That if they see injustice they should speak up.
What was your research process to engage with the main characters and the world building across three books?
For Birds on the Brain, I needed to do quite a bit of research on Indian birds, including downloading the e-Bird app and walking around in a couple of neighborhoods in Chennai trying to imagine how Reeni would use the app and what she’d be likely to notice. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology was an invaluable resource.
For The Sunshine Project, I watched a lot of karate videos and I learned as much as I could about household solar installation projects across southern India. Oh, and I became fascinated with mangrove forests and efforts to preserve coastal mangroves in Tamilnadu.
As to worldbuilding, it felt to me as if I were returning to a fictional place I knew already, only this time I was accompanied by a different tour guide. Reeni and Anil each gave me perspectives on a neighborhood I had already mapped out; each brought unique personality and viewpoint to bear on a setting I felt as if I knew. My work in each case was to create the conditions for my characters to seize the story and make it their own. Reeni wasn’t bashful about this. Anil needed some coaxing—and prodding.
The Book Uncle character says in the story that he loves it when his books travel, whether they go far and wide or circulate in the city where the characters live. Could you explain how you drew this slice-of-life moment from your own experience?
It’s funny you should ask that. In the 1930’s, Louise Rosenblatt wrote that novels and poems and plays are incomplete until readers have read them. Texts are merely squiggles on the page until readers invest them with meaning. That meaning, moreover, is drawn from readers’ own life experiences.
This makes the act of reading centered upon the reader, which I’ve long thought to be a wonderful way to think about books and readers. The thought of readers all over the world finding enjoyment in my books, and finding meaning—that’s a gift beyond compare.
During the editing process with The Sunshine Project, when we needed a reflective moment for Anil to slow down and take stock of what was needed of him, it seemed natural for that moment to involve books. It felt entirely plausible for Anil to have a conversation with Book Uncle about his motto—you know, “the right book for the right person on the right day.” It wasn’t until I finished writing that scene that I looked back and I thought, Hey, look! Book Uncle’s talking about centering readers! Of course he is!
I will add that most reviewers don’t notice stuff like this, so I was completely delighted to find one who did: [Ginny Ratsoy for The British Columbia Review].
How do you celebrate success?
Does gardening count? Once I was done with copyedits on The Sunshine Project, I realized that it was time to go out and plant tomatoes. So that is what I did, and it was very satisfying. As I write this, the tomatoes are ripening outside my window.
Looking back, what is the biggest lesson you’ve learned from writing this trilogy?
That everything we write is in some ways incomplete. Everything has seeds in it that can be used to grow something new, even when that new work wasn’t what we originally intended.
What do you love most about the creative life/being an author and a teacher?
I don’t teach anymore, but when I did, my teaching felt like an integral part of my writing life. My writing allows me an incredible interior life populated by the books I read, the conversations I have with those books, and the way this shapes my own thinking. After so many years of doing this, I can’t imagine what else I could possibly do but write.
I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to send my books out into the world. If no one ever published another word I wrote, I’d still have to carry on writing—I’d probably write grumpy little pieces and foist them on unsuspecting people.
What are you working on next?
I just finished edits on a picture book about sunshine and climate and mangos (I still want to spell that with an ‘e’ after the ‘o’ but American spelling conventions demand that I drop it!) that won’t be out for another year or two. This leaves me in a strange, restless place between projects.
My agent is reading a middle grade novel draft, so I can’t tinker with that right now. Another picture book and a toddler book are out on submission.
Once I’ve cleaned my office and cleared my desk and made a small dent in books to be read, I shall have to look at partial work and unfinished work and work that only exists in scribbled notes. But I’m not there yet. For now, I’m letting this in-between time run its course.
Cynsational Notes
Uma Krishnaswami has been writing for young readers for thirty years. Her novels include Naming Maya (2024 Phoenix Award), Step Up to the Plate Maria Singh (Asian Pacific American Award for Literature), Book Uncle and Me (Crossword Award, ILA Social Justice Literature Award), and its sequels, Birds on the Brain and The Sunshine Project. She’s also written picture books like Monsoon, Two at the Top: A Shared Dream of Everest, Out of the Way! Out of the Way! and Look! Look! (USBBY Outstanding International Book). Uma taught for sixteen years in the MFA program in Writing for Children and Young Adults at Vermont College of Fine Arts, mentoring many successful writers.
Suma Subramaniam is the author of several children’s books including the V. Malar series (Candlewick Press, 2024, 2025, 2027), My Name Is Long As A River (Penguin Workshop, 2024), and Crystal Kite Award Winner, Namaste Is A Greeting (Candlewick Press, 2022). Her poems have been published in the Young People’s Poetry edition of Poetry Magazine from Poetry Foundation. She is a volunteer at We Need Diverse Books and SCBWI Western Washington. When she’s not writing, she’s blogging about children’s books. Suma has an MFA in Creative Writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts. Learn more at https://sumasubramaniam.com.