Tag: conversations

📚NEW SERIES RELEASE 📖

On By Mahvash K. M.In BookReading, bookworm, childrensbooks, kidlit, Kidsbooks, verse, womenwriters, writingLeave a comment

THE HEALING SERIES 👧🏻👦🏽❤️‍🩹

Dear all,

I’m happy to introduce my new Healing Series for children ages 6 to 10. This has been a labour of love and grew into the current 4-book series when friends and family spoke of a vacuum in the children’s literature space – there were very few books which allowed painful, stressful events in the child’s life to be softened in the gentle flow of story-telling.

The Healing Series includes coping with:

  • Bullying
  • Suddenly becoming an older sibling to a new brother or sister
  • The loss of a parent (will be in stores in May 2025)
  • Parents’ separation (will be in stores in May 2025)

Traumatic experiences can initiate strong emotions and physical reactions that can persist long after the event. Children may feel terror, helplessness, agitation or fear as well as physiological reactions such as heart pounding, vomiting, or loss of bowel or bladder control. It is critical to identify when a child is feeling deep seated discomfort which they are not able to verbalize. Other overt behavioural signs and symptoms include acting out or withdrawing, nightmares, physical ailments, difficulty concentrating, clingy/separation anxiety, crying frequently, self destructive behaviour, academic struggles and loss of appetite. These are the most common, but the whole gamut of emotional and behavioral symptoms can be wide and varied. Basically, any behaviour that is not normal for the child should be considered a signal for help.

Consider these books, then, as a way of starting conversations with your child about events and circumstance that may be distressing them. Every story in this collection gently holds the child’s hand and helps them navigate the confusing, painful and daunting times that they find themselves in.

In our beautiful but imperfect world, I hope that these books through the magic of story-telling in the safe haven of home and family, help to protect and nurture the mental and emotional wellbeing of our children 🌸.

SRI LANKA: The books are currently available in most bookstores across the island
PAKISTAN: The books will be available at Liberty Books, Paramount Books and the London Book Company in a couple of months.
KOBO: Will be available on KOBO by the end of April 2025.

VERSE | OUTSIDE IN

On By Mahvash K. M.In poetry, serenity, truth, verse, womenwriters, writing5 Comments 
We were talking
About this and that
The conversation meandering 
Sometimes off the beaten track
Into more private realms
Reticent spaces holding 
Secret reflections, introspection
Ruminations that had rarely seen 
The light of day
Hesitating, faltering, we walked along
That path hewn on the cusp of right and wrong
Where perplexing thoughts lay vulnerable, bare
And then we heard the call to prayer

She rose with an alacrity borne of custom 
With velvety smooth liquid motions 
Like a babbling stream that has
No more reason to be but because
It can flow gliding in its bed of silt and stone
She floated through the ritual 
Sure, secure in the discerning eyes 
Of her faithful world. On the outside 
She had done the needful, the right thing
She came back to our conversation
Her face shining with virtue, beneficence 

But now the doors were closed
To the questions that had peeked through
The heavy, opaque veils of tradition and goodness
Back they had sunk into the clenched depths
From which they had inadvertently crept
She looked at me with guarded eyes
Lest I scratch that surface again
Lest she forget what keeps her true and safe

I smiled and she smiled back at me
“Have another cup of tea”
She said bringing the conversation 
Back to the glittering streets 
Of the daily treads of teeming feet
And I followed, leaving the track
Lit up by mysterious stars and the soul-searching gleam 
Of the moon that now shone on our backs.