Meet Austin, world’s youngest fi ction writer from Bengaluru

Rachana Ramesh | NT

While adults struggle to draft a few paragraphs for a letter, an eight-year-old from Bengaluru has written a whole book. Titled ‘Grandma and Austin’s Plant Kingdom’, the book narrates stories of love and learning that Austin came across when he visited his grandparents’ house in Kerala.

The fiction, much inspired by his real life experiences, has a protagonist who travels to his ancestral home during his summer vacation. Unfortunately, the pandemic spreads and he gets stuck in Kerala. The disappointed little boy comes to discover that his grandparents own a huge farm and spends the rest of his time learning more about the plant kingdom.

Austin said he took inspiration from a lot of things to create characters and scenes in the book. “I took some inspiration from the pandemic, a little from my biology teacher who taught us a lot about plants and a lot from my grandparents and the places I visited with them,” he said in a chattery tone and continued to give examples.

A bridge above a pool of water filled with fishes near his grandparents’ house and the various kinds of farmlands surrounding the area helped him create a background for his characters to prance around. One of the characters, the farmland dog, is inspired by a neighbour’s dog named Jack.

There’s also an elephant, Austin exclaimed, and said he has incorporated his friends from Kerala too. By publishing his first book, Austin will be setting a record of being the youngest fiction writer in the world. With this India sets a new record to have the youngest authors in both fiction and the non-fiction categories.

Abhiujitha Gupta from Ghaziabad had earlier set a record under the non-fiction category. He has also been recently accepted into the India Book Records, as the youngest book author in the category of writing about nature. Austin said the idea to write a book came when he thought to make a “little money” to donate it to charitable organisations that rehabilitate animals.

“I also did it just for the fun of it. It’s fun to write a book. But while doing so I had a little hope that it would help another being,” he said. He will donate all the money received from his book sale to Wildlife SOS, a non-profit organisation that works on animal conservation. He is an active supporter of the NGO and is currently sponsoring one of the rescued bears named ‘Kuber’. Kuber is an Indian Sloth Bear (Melursus Ursinus), who can easily be recognised by their shaggy black coat, long muzzle, protruding lip and a distinct white V-shaped patch on the chest. Wildlife SOS has rehabilitated 620 of these bears, out of which Kuber is one.

“He has been sick ever since he was rescued. He needs to go through laser therapy for his arthritis. He has a lot of problems,” he said.

Austin visits his sloth bear at the Bannerghatta zoo whenever he gets an opportunity. He has even created handmade get well soon card for him. Apart from reading and writing, Austin likes to draw, paint and travel to discover new places and new animals.

The Kratt Brothers and David Attenbourgh are a few among the long list of wildlife conservationists and enthusiasts who inspire Austin each day. He wants to be a palaeontologist in the future because he loves dinosaurs and if that does not work out, he does not mind being a naturalist. Then, he came to the conclusion that if he can pursue both, he will.

To a question on whether there will be more writing in the future, Austin said: “Definitely. I am already working on something. I am not going to say anything about it, no spoilers!”