Will you read with me, asks Dravid

Oozing wit and charm, the cricket hero reveals a rare side of himself, at the launch of Crickematics, as someone who readily espouses children's causes

Oozing wit and charm, the cricket hero reveals a rare side of himself, at the launch of Crickematics, as someone who readily espouses children's causes

Numbers can be fun: Anshumani Ruddra, the author

Thanks to a cool dude called Anshumani Ruddra, it's no longer pathetic to be described as a geek. This IITian charmed audiences, young and young-at-heart, at the launch of his audio book Crickematics, which has Rahul Dravid playing narrator.u00a0

The author and the batsman came together to read excerpts from the book and share a witty conversation about their childhood heroes at the launch of Karadi Tales' latest offering in the Will You Read With Me series.u00a0

While Anshumani spoke of how he found cricket fascinating because it has a great deal of Math, Rahul cheerfully admitted that he identifies with the protagonist, Anirudh, because Math was never one of his favourite subjects in school, earning himself a roar of approval from the kids in the audience.

But responsible role model that he is, he exhorted the young 'uns to work hard at solving Math problems while honing their strokes. And when one kid piped up with a plaintive, "But how do you hit sixes?" Rahul deadpanned, "I am not sure I hit them well enough. I've been trying hard for many years. Sometimes, I just get lucky!"

He won little hearts when he blurted out the answer to a question on the Crickematics quiz and got it wrong!

And, he happily shared the spotlight with Anshumani, egging everyone to direct questions to the author because the story was so well written that it would do well despite himself as the first-time narrator!

Crickematics is the story of young Anirudh, a gifted player who flunks Math, and gets a dressing down from his school principal and cricket coach. His fear of Math leads to him come perilously close to being ousted from the school cricket team as he suffers number nightmares that paralyse him on the field.
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"When I heard that skilled artistes like Aamir Khan, Girish Karnad and Naseeruddin Shah were narrators in the earlier Karadi Tales, I was filled with trepidation. But Narayan Parasuram, the gifted composer of Karadi Tales, and Shobha Vishwanath, publishing director of Karadi Tales, convinced me, and here I am," he explained.

Confessing that he enjoyed Archies, The Hardy Boys and then Richard Bach, not Duckworth-Lewis, he admitted that it's a huge challenge to get children to read books in a world that has the Web and television.u00a0

Shobha, who skillfully moderated the event, steering questions away from cricket controversies to books, urged young parents to cheer their brats when they found storybooks hidden between textbooks while Narayan injected a dose of spontaneity into the evening with his robust rendition of a cricket song as everyone clapped along.

Crickematics will be available at Landmark exclusively for two weeks before making its way to the shelves of other bookstores in the city. And Karadi has also launched a tactile version of all their titles to help blind children enjoy these tales.

Read and run

That suave and smashing Rahul Dravid can set off a stampede among six- to sixty-year-olds was evident from the high drama at the book launch of Karadi Tales' new series, Will You Read With Me?

Landmark at Forum Mall was overflowing with pushy parents and overwhelmed kids on Saturday evening. While the kids kept calm, it was the grown-ups who went berserk on sighting their cricket hero. They hailed him like a long-lost buddy, shouted out questions at him and even yelled answers during the children's quiz.u00a0u00a0

Calm before the storm: (from left) Narayan Parasuram, Rahul Dravid, Anshumani Ruddra and Shobha Vishwanath at the book launch Pics/ Satish Badiger

But the worst of the lot were a couple of shutterbugs who traded insults with each other, as they scrambled all over the store, in a bit to get the best shot of Rahul. When some fans at the back of the hall beseeched them to sit down and click pictures instead of blocking everyone's view of the stage, one of them crowed, "Do you know who we are?" Rahul's look of disbelief on overhearing the exchange tells us what he would have replied had he not been the gentleman he is.

After the book reading and the Q&A, the floor was opened to autograph hunters and that's when pandemonium broke out. The surge of fans gave the organisers a panic attack. Rahul was whisked out of the bookstore by burly security guards but not before he cast an apologetic look at the bewildered kids, some of who had carted along cricket bats larger than themselves.u00a0