What to read

The NLF Reading Challenge 2026 Book List brings together the best of children’s literature available in the Indian market, striving to push children’s reading horizons, encouraging them to look beyond the bestsellers that dominate the market, while taking into account availability, affordability, and student interests.

Participants will read acclaimed books published in recent years, across genres and forms and themes. Be it graphic novels (Unfairies, Kishore Ashore, The Cartoonists Club), delightful murder mysteries (The Mizzy Mysteries: A Skeleton in the Closet, Murder! By Narwhal!), whimsical poetry (Dancing Frogs and Other Creatures in Verse), non-fiction (Ancient Indians) or even a story told from the perspective of a typewriter (Olivetti), the list offers something for every kind of reader. Needless to say, the list also features several contemporary fantasy & sci-fi titles—wildly imaginative stories that captivate audiences and hold up a mirror to the joys and follies and foibles of the ‘real’ world.

Spanning prehistoric India, dystopian futures, and magical universes, the titles on our list travel across time and space and reality. To borrow from Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop, we hope these books act as “mirrors, windows, and sliding glass doors” for young readers, sparking their imaginations, cultivating their curiosity about themselves and the vast worlds they inhabit.