Ruskin Bond
has been around the corner for over sixty years. You must have read various Ruskin Bond books and stories in your school or seen his books in the bookstores near you. Known for
simple and engaging tales, his stories often take us to the foothills of the
Himalaya and there we get chance to peep in the lives of those simple people
who remain at a distance from the lights of city life. For this reason, Ruskin
Bond is a legendary writer, especially among children. So far, he has penned
down over 500 stories in the form of short stories, novels, non-fiction and so
on. If you love Ruskin Bond books and feel like to explore his most
popular or best books, then here we bring the long list for you.
- The Blue Umbrella by Ruskin Bond
It is a story
of Binya and her obsession for her beautiful frilly umbrella. The story is
staged against the foothills of the Himalaya – Garhwal. Binya is a fearless girl of around eleven or twelve – she
often takes her cows (Neelu and Gori)
out for grazing. One day she stumbles upon a bunch of tourists from city people
and there she trades her leopard-claw pendent for the blue umbrella. The story
is all-time favourite and takes a benign stand on themes like kindness and
compassion. Read on to know what happens when her blue umbrella is stolen by a dishonest shopkeeper.
- The Sensualist: A Cautionary Tale by Ruskin Bond
The Sensualist
by Ruskin Bond is not a children’s book. Rather this book takes a stance on a
man who once was obsessed with sex and driving pleasure from women. This book,
in particular, discusses the darker aspect of human psyche. The narrator is
walking long a river bank while going somewhere up in the hills. As it begins
to rain, he seeks shelter in a cave. The cave is inhabited by a man: he is like
a saint but of well-built physique. The narrator and the man begin
conversation. The saint-like man talks about his past life and how he came into
the hills. Both men are nameless in the story; the only names that appear in
the story are of women. Liked it, read the full story at your pace…
- Romi and the Wildfire by Ruskin Bond
Romi’s father
has gifted him a new bicycle and on it he has come to a different village to
collect some medical pills for his father. In the evening, while going back
home, he passes through a forest which is under fire, soon he stumbles upon
another boy who too is struggling under the forest fire. They both ride the
bicycle hard to get out of the forest…but it is a long way. Will they manage to
cross the forest fire or succumb to it? A classic tale on wildfire…
- Love among the Bookshelves by Ruskin Bond
In case you
are an ardent Ruskin Bond fan, by reading this book, you will get to know why
he loved reading books and how those books influenced his life on the whole.
Here the stories are not written by Ruskin Bond but by his favourite writers,
for instance Love Among the Chickens
by P.G. Wodehouse. It is a treasure trove, read all stories at your convenience…
- Grandfather’s Private Zoo by Ruskin Bond
Grandfather’s
Private Zoo by Ruskin Bond is a widely held tale among children, for it depicts
personal behavior of animals and birds brought home to add to the personal zoo.
Rather a tale of a nature (flora and fauna) lover who loves to keep a
collection of animals and birds, at time even reptiles. Grandfather’s Private
Zoo is a novella consisting nine well-connected stories. Read on to know more...
- Grandpa Fights an Ostrich by Ruskin Bond
Grandpa Fights
an Ostrich by Ruskin Bond is a short story about his grandfather’s fight with
an Ostrich in East Africa. Before joining the Indian Railways, he had worked
for East African Railway long time ago. Ruskin’s grandfather was living in a
small town in Africa. Well, there is more to the story, but how he did he get into
the fight? Read on to know more...
- Tales of Fosterganj by Ruskin Bond
Tales of
Fosterganj by Ruskin Bond is a full-fledged novel based on his living
experience in a small town called Fosterganj. He went there to live for some
time in 1961. First, Ruskin goes to Mussoorie as a tourist from Delhi. Then,
one morning he hikes downhill only to find himself in a slow-paced town called
Fosterganj. He liked the place instantly because of less crowd and slow-paced
life. Interesting events take place there. Read on what kind of place is Fosterganj…
- A Long Walk for Bina by Ruskin Bond
A Long Walk
for Bina is a fascinating story about the people of hills. Ruskin is well
famous for taking up themes like wild animal conservation, beauty of nature,
and childhood memories. This book is written so beautifully that it consists of
all three elements mentioned just now. The best thing about this book is that
it does not belong to some particular characters. Here everyone looks equally
important and interesting. In the centerline is the understanding of children and a leopard…
- Death Under the Deodars by Ruskin Bond
Death Under
the Deodars by Ruskin Bond is a collection of eight murder mysteries. All
stories features the adventures of Miss Ripley-Bean, a seventy year old
spinster who lives in a hotel in Mussoorie. Either Miss Ripley-Bean
investigates the murder mystery accidentally or she narrates the old tales from
her time i.e. when she was very young. Well, all stories are terrific in
intensity and will never take you till the last page. Interested? Here is your chance to meet Miss Ripley Bean…
- Getting Granny’s Glasses by Ruskin Bond
Getting
Granny’s Glasses is a short story by Ruskin Bond based on the tender
relationship between maternal grandmother and her grandson Mani, an eleven-year
old boy. His mother passed when he was one year old. Since then, Mani and his
father are both under the care of grandma. She is seventy but performs all the
chores of home as she is a young energetic girl. Well, the problem is that
granny’s glasses are not functional – will she get the new pair? Find out…
- The Room on the Roof by Ruskin Bond
Ruskin Bond
wrote this book when he went abroad for four years in search of career. He was
seventeen at the time of writing this book. Spiraling out of his personal
experiences, the major theme of the book is teenage rebel – Rusty an orphaned
English boy struggles for freedom while staying with his cruel guardian. It is
an interesting book about loneliness and friendship and many more aspects. You
will love this book for sure. Get it here…
- Time Stops at Shamli by Ruskin Bond
Shamli is a
small-village kind of place in the foothills of the Himalayas. Whenever the
narrator (Ruskin) travels to Delhi from Dehradun or vice versa, train stops at
Shamli exactly for five minutes. Strange is that no one gets down or boards the
train. Then, why does it stop there? He is inquisitive about this place. He
wants to know what lies behind the station walls, behind the forest that starts
immediately after the station platform. Several times he wished to get down to
seek answers arising out of curiosity, but he could never muster up that
courage. Will he find out more about this place? Go and find out yourself…
- Gracie by Ruskin Bond
Gracie is a
lengthy story covered in the book Secrets by Ruskin Bond. Gracie is a story of
a woman in the heat of World War Two. She was a pretty lady of seventeen or
eighteen with English, Portuguese, Burmese and Indian descent. The narrator
Ruskin is younger to her by a decade but still he falls in love with her. Well,
all love stories aren’t that straight. Read on to know more…
- Over the Wall by Ruskin Bond
Over the Wall
is a lengthy story covered in the book ‘Secrets’ by Ruskin Bond. It is a
soulful story with themes like compassion and humanity. The time period of the
story is of around ten years, like from pre-independence to post independence
of India. The narrator is a ten-year-old boy who comes down to Dehradun from
Shimla to spend three-month long winter vacation at his granny’s bungalow. They
are Anglo-Indians. Around the granny’s house, he sees two more bungalows from
over the wall. Melvilles’ bungalow has vibrant environment: in that house
people come and go and parties take place. The second bungalow is of Johnsons.
Their front and backyard is not neat and tidy, grass and shrub have been grown
all over the corners. Except dhobi and cooks, no other people enter their
premises and evening parties never take place. In the backyard, at a distance
of some yards, there is a hut-like cottage and the window of that cottage opens
up at the time of receiving food otherwise it remains shut. The boy grows
curious to find out what lies there; what’s inside? Yes...let's take a look inside...
- The Cherry Tree by Ruskin Bond
The Cherry
Tree by Ruskin Bond is a very nice book promoting the importance of nature
through a very cute boy Rakesh, aged six. Rakesh casually throws three seeds of
cherry in his garden and in some time he sees a cherry plant coming up. But, he
is obsessed about its growth and height. He wants to see it growing but well
before that there are obstacles in the way. What are those obstacles? If you
have green fingers, find out yourself…
- A Flight of Pigeons by Ruskin Bond
In the heat of
war, civilians and innocents are doomed to get singed. A Flight of Pigeons by
Ruskin Bond is one such story which underlines the agony of miserable people
amidst the war days. At the time of sepoy mutiny of 1857 in India, the time was
building around to free the country from the clutches of the British Raj. And
because of this mutiny, Ruth Labadoor and her family sees the worst days of
their lives…her father is dead, now what next? Very gripping story! Take it forward from here on…
- The Road to the Bazaar by Ruskin Bond
The longest
novella in the Children’s Omnibus is ‘The Road to the Bazaar’. However, The
Road to the Bazaar is not a rhythmic story; rather it features a collection of
Bond’s favorite characters such as Suraj, Koki, Ranji, Anil, Amir, Teju, Nathu
and many more. And all protagonists of the stories are children - which indeed is rare in the Indian literature arena.
- The Night Train at Deoli by Ruskin Bond
We all would
like to meet or see someone worth remembering later in life. And normally this
urge is very high when we travel on a train. The Night Train at Deoli is one
such story where a young boy of around eighteen meets a poor and beautiful girl
on a lonely platform. Find out whether he will get that girl or not?
- A Face in the Dark by Ruskin Bond
A Face in the
Dark by Ruskin Bond is a very popular short story that has been passed on from
one generation to another. It falls in the purview of mystery and suspense
genre. Through this story the author asserts that even people powerful and
non-believers of evil spirits go blank or have their heart attack when
confronted by strange and horrible situations. Well, this story tests the guts
of Mr. Oliver. Can he survive the shock...
- Vagrants in the Valley by Ruskin Bond
Vagrants in
the Valley by Ruskin Bond is a wonderful book dealing with the loneliness of
Rusty–Ruskin Bond’s favorite character–and to some extent Rusty is the
reflection of Bond’s early life spent in many North Indian cities. The book is
a sequel to the book ‘The Room on the Roof’ and is also a part of the Rusty
series books. It is a great book for orphans - how they struggle and live in
the society. Read about his discover of self...
- Angry River by Ruskin Bond
Angry River is
a beautifully written novella by Ruskin Bond. The main theme of the story is
nature. When nature causes havoc, humans find it tough to avert. Though this
story is of a poor little girl – she is too innocent and out of world to create
any damage to nature, well she is concerning the voice of many who get stuck
with the ways of nature. Continue reading to know her little story…
- Dust on the Mountains by Ruskin Bond
Dust on the
Mountains by Ruskin Bond subtly highlights the grim issues of deforestation on
the mountains in the wake of modernization. The protagonist Bisnu, a young lad,
leaves his village for city to find work in order to feed his family. Read the story to know his struggle...
- The Woman on Platform Number 8 by Ruskin Bond
This story is,
for sure, will touch your heart. The story is about love and affection beyond
all relations. Arun, a young boy, while waiting for his train at a railway
station meets a woman. She acts like his mother and Arun, too, for some time
forgets his own mother and feels a deep affection for her. Very nostalgic in
its essence. It is a must read…
- Binya Passes By – Ruskin Bond
It is a love
cum ghost story. The narrator, a struggling writer, lives in the hill but so
often he hears a mignon voice of a girl. And soon he sets himself to find that
singer. Will he be able to trace her or not? Well, you can definitely find out…
- Escape from Java by Ruskin Bond
The story is
staged against the WW-II, especially when the power of Japan and its allies
were increasing. With Singapore fallen to Japanese, positive rumours are that
soon Java will be in the grip of Japan because Dutch is not as strong as the
British to resist the mighty Japanese. All outsiders are busy escaping Java; no
one is interested in saving it from Japanese. Will they come out of that
island? May be...
- The Eyes of the Eagle by Ruskin Bond
Jai a young
boy has come up over the hills at his grandparents to while away his autumn.
When Jai and his dog go out with herd of cattle, they are confronted with
terror of two eagles. Will Jai and his dog fight to save his cattle? Probably,yes...
- A Handful of Nuts by Ruskin Bond
A Handful of
Nuts means a few friends who roam around the small town and make each other’s
lives tough, if not hell. It is a story of Ruskin Bond by Ruskin Bond –
especially when he newly entered into the vertices of adolescent. The story is
set in Dehradun – of 1950s – where the narrator lives alone and to accompany
him are a few friends who like him are ambitious but empty on pockets. Thus, he
being a struggling writer often gives them his money, which he not so
frequently receives from newspapers or magazines that publish his work. The
only worry of his life is that the pay cheques don’t come regularly. Despite
having less money, his life is at large good and going. Meet his crazy friends…
- Rusty Goes to London by Ruskin Bond
Rusty Goes to
London is a throwback of Ruskin Bond’s yesteryear, highlighting his dream to
become a writer at a very young age. So, through this book Ruskin (as goes
Rusty) tried to explain the kind of struggle he had to become an established
writer. Read on to know his struggles…
- Delhi Is Not Far by Ruskin Bond
The story is
about lower-middle-class yet busy people who live in a town and manage
day-to-day difficulties. It features a slew of characters – all ambitious but
tied to their native town Pipalnagar in more than one ways. Let’s peep into their lives…
- At Sea with Uncle Ken by Ruskin Bond
Young Ruskin
is going to England and to assist him throughout the voyage he has a company of
his uncle named Ken. Well, instead of helping young Ruskin smoothing out his
journey, Uncle Ken invites trouble unwittingly. If you love humorous tales, go for it…
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