Magic Begins In Your Heart – The Boy Who Made Magic [Review]

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Book Title: The Boy Who Made Magic – P.C. Sorcar (Dreamers Series)
Written and Illustrated By: Lavanya Karthik
Publisher: Duckbill – An imprint of Penguin Random House
Type: Paperback
No. of Pages: 48
Age Group: 6-9 years (publisher’s recommendation is 7 years+)

Growing up in Kolkata I knew P.C. Sorcar as the “King of Indian Magic”. He is the man who is known as the father of modern Indian magic and rightfully so. At a time, when India was only thought to be a country of snake charmers and poor people, when the British thought very little of Indian magic, it was P.C. Sorcar who changed the perception of the western audience and took Indian magic across the globe. But I didn’t know the story of young Protul this way.

Protul Chandra Sarkar, who later changed his surname to Sorcar to bring in the touch of magic, is perhaps the greatest magician in the world. But was he born with this magic or did he learn it through hardwork?

The answer to this is not very simple. I believe in the saying – dreams don’t work unless you do and Protul’s story makes me believe in this more.  He was born with a dream to learn magic and it was his perseverance, faith and sheer determination that made him who he was.

Lavanya Karthik has beautifully captured the life of young Protul. His desire to learn the tricks was so strong that he managed to impress the then greatest magician of Bengal – Ganapati Chakraborty to be his mentor and teacher. And under his expert guidance, Protul became P.C. Sorcar who took Indian magic to great heights.  His shows, full of pomp and grandeur, were a treat for the audience – big and small.

The life of P.C. Sorcar teaches a very important life lesson – that magic begins in your heart… and how true is that?! The magic is within us, we just need to have that faith and peep inside to know that yes we can do it!

I found this story immensely powerful in terms of explaining to kids how one should never give up on their dreams and always follow their heart. Protul taught us that magic is inside each one of us and P.C. Sorcar showed us how that same magic was to be showcased on the world stage.

Lavanya Karthik’s way of writing and blending the story is so easy going that the story was enjoyed by my 6 year old as well as 9 year old. And the illustrations are pure magic.

P.S. This is one book which we read from cover to back cover and enjoyed reading about the author a lot. My boys were in splits to read the short bio of the author. I don’t want to give it away but it is indeed the best.

You can find the rest of the books from the Dreamers series here.

We have other reviews of books in the Dreamer Series which might interest you:
The Girl Who Was A Forest – Janaki Ammal
The Boys Who Created Malgudi – R. K. Narayan and R. K. Laxman
The Girl Who Loved To Sing – Teejan Bai 
The Boy Who Loved Birds – Salim Ali
The Girl Who Loved Words – Mahasweta Devi

If you enjoyed this review and would like to create magic, then you might want to buy the book from Amazon (kbc affiliate link),

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Disclaimer: Achira and her sons are part of the #kbcReviewerSquad and received this book as a review copy from the publisher.