A Cloud Called Bhura

Book excerpt: From award-winning author Bijal Vachharajani, A Cloud Called Bhura is a delightful middle-grade novel that tackles climate change through an inspiring lens of friendship, trust, and community. Amni wakes up one morning to find the sky taken over by a huge brown cloud. Even as she and her friends start to discover more, their city of Mumbai starts reeling from the changes the cloud brings to the weather. Bhura Cloudus (as the media calls it) causes scalding rain to fall, makes birds flee the city, and suffocates every living thing. As chaos continues to build and the climate changes brought by Bhura become disastrous, there are several questions on everyone’s mind: What will the powerful politician, Mota Bhai, do now? Can the scientist twins Vidisha and Bidisha find a solution? What about superstar Pavan Kumar and the amazing cloud-sucking machine? Will Bhura ever be driven away—or is it already too late? Thought-provoking, funny, and inspiring, A Cloud Called Bhura is about changing global climate and the havoc it can cause—as well as the forces of friendship, trust, and community that give hope and help counter this deadly threat to humanity.