A Taste of Honey - Rebecca Sheir - ★★★.¾

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AUTHOR: Rebecca Sheir
ILLUSTRATOR: Chaaya Prabhat
GENRE: Children's Picture Book
PUBLICATION DATE: June 28, 2022
RATING: 3.75 stars.

A Taste of Honey delivers the right level of sweetness, just as its title suggests.

The story is derived from an old Indian folktale. I remember reading the original, and I love the changes that the author has made to that narrative.

Kamala is a young woman who keeps beehives and sells the collected honey in the local market. When business is too slow and she is struggling to make do, she approaches the king for assistance. Instead of giving her an outright sum, the king allots to her a plot of land and makes a deal that of whatever she earns from that plot, she can keep half. Kamala decides to make the best of this opportunity, but soon realises that the plot is on the outskirts of the town, the area is known for being a hideout for thieves, and the land itself is a mess of weeds and sticks. How Kamala uses her brains to earn a fair income from this land forms the rest of the story.

This is one of those few folktales where a woman is shown as using her brains, and not her feminine wiles and guiles, for the benefit of her family and for victory over the bad guys. Kamala is a great character to learn from, as she knows when to seek help and also when to help herself. She is an independent girl, a smart thinker and a hard worker. I wish her dad weren’t portrayed as a dull, sleeping character for about half the book. Making him look bad isn’t the only way of making Kamala look good.

The illustrations are pretty nice, and as exotic as the western market would be happy to see. I wasn’t perfectly happy with them. The dad looked more like a granddad, and the clothes & jewellery that Kamala and her dad wear make them look more like fairly wealthy landowners than poor sellers struggling to make a living. Nevertheless, the colour scheme and the vibrant pages are appealing enough.

There are some very interesting activities at the end such as how to make your own shadow puppet theatre, some questions and what-if situations related to the story, and the author’s note detailing the original tale and what changes she made in this version. I found all of this extra content enjoyable.

All in all, a fun and exciting read for little ones with a smart woman leading the way.

My thanks to Storey Publishing and NetGalley for the ARC of “A Taste of Honey”. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.

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