We Once Were Gazelles
Author: Michael Chacko Daniels
Illustrator: Rukmini Chakravarty
Pages: 468
Year of Publication: 2020
Price: Rs 1000 / $40
ISBN:
978-81-946740-7-8 (9788194674078)
About the Author
Michael Chacko Daniels lives and writes in San Francisco. He grew up in Bombay, where he attended St. Michael’s High School, Wilson College, and University of Bombay’s Department of Economics. He has a Master’s degree from
Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism. His parents grew up in an ancient Syrian Christian community in the South Indian state of Kerala. In their middle years, in Bombay, they joined the local Baptist Church out of conviction. His adventures in the United States include five years as a Volunteer In Service To America (VISTA); four as editor/publisher of the New River Free Press of Grand Rapids, Michigan; four as assistant editor in San Francisco at The Asia Foundation; and sixteen at Berkeley’s Center for Independent Living. He helped start the Jobs for Homeless Consortium of Alameda County in 1988, and to run it through mid-2004. He is a naturalized citizen of the United States. This is the eighth book he has published with Writers Workshop, India.
About the Illustrator
Rukmini Chakravarty is an artist and illustrator based in Kolkata. After getting a Master’s in Fine Arts in printmaking from Kala Bhavana, Shantiniketan, she studied painting, photography, book art, and printmaking at the Aegean Center for Fine Arts in Paros, Greece. To pursue her interest in engaging with rural communities, she worked as a Creative Arts teacher at the Rosehips Centre in Marpha, Nepal, and engaged with Dhokra artists at the Devrai Art Village, Panchgani, Maharashtra. She was a Resident Artist at Cona Foundation, Mumbai. Publishers of her illustrations include the Baithak Foundation (Pune), Anjali Mental Health Rights Organization (Kolkata), Pluto Children’s Magazine (Ektara), and Village Community Development Association (Pune).
About the Book
In this coming of age novel set in 1950s Bombay, Michael Chacko Daniels explores both an India that was cosmopolitan, and the slow rise in exclusionary politics in the country, through the life of a Malayali Syrian Christian boy growing up at that time.