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Summer’s song

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  (This book review was first written for Amritabharati) Summer’s Song Title: Bena’s Summer Author: Shibal Bhartiya Pages: 247 Publisher: HarperCollinsChildren’s Books From its first page, Bena’s Summer draws you into a world that is fast fading away -- of innocence, believing in and doing the good, trust and happiness. The story is a visual treat of a summer that promises fun with cousins, climbing trees, eating raw mangoes and reveling in the pleasure of having outsmarted elders. Set somewhere in the 80s, Bena’s Summer travels to Gaya in Bihar, where her paternal relatives stay in Altamash Manzil and later to Sultanpur, Uttar Pradesh, where her maternal grandparents and aunt live.   A largely autbobiographical story of Shibal Bhartiya, her protagonist Bena or Benzair Altamash is a precocious eight-year-old. Bena is generous to a fault and believes in the goodness of all; sometimes she does stumble and makes an unkind remark, but apologises straight from the heart when she realise