Lowji Discovers America
By Candace Fleming
Atheneum/Anne Schwartz Books, 2005

Review by Pooja Makhijani
From Kahani Winter 2008


When Lowji Sanjana’s mother gets a high-tech job in Illinois, Lowji is devastated. He doesn’t want to leave the big city of Bombay for a small town in the United States. He also doesn’t want to live without his grandparents, his aunts and uncles, and his best friend, Jamshed.
“Find the silver lining,” says Lowji’s father, but 9-year-old Lowji cannot find any silver lining. Jamshed, however, finds some silver. “In America you can finally have a dog!” he says, reminding Lowji that his current building does not allow pets. “A dog who will sleep on your bed. A dog who will play ball with you.”

Unfortunately, when Lowji arrives in Hamlet, Illinois, he discovers that rules in apartment building do not differ from country to country; his new home will not allow any pets either. Bummer! thinks Lowji.

Faced with a summer of no friends and nothing to do, likable Lowji begins to learn funny English expressions (“Lemony fresh!”), spreads peanut butter and jelly on rotli, and softens his cantankerous, animal-averse landlady, Ms. Crisp. He watches the girl who passes his building on her blue bicycle and wonders what it feels like to wear a mitt and throw and catch with the neighborhood boys.

Candace Fleming, best known for Ben Franklin’s Almanac, has written a light-hearted tale about a little boy who longs for a friend. The book is full of memorable characters—Lowji’s quirky, optimistic father, a pig-loving grown-up named Ironman, and Landlady Crisp. Interspersed throughout the engaging narrative are letters from Lowji to Jamshed, detailing his new life and his search for silver linings.

An informative author’s note tells readers that “India is a country of many languages” and that the English used in India–and throughout this book¬–is “a unique sort of English because it is sprinkled with Indian words. . .they work just like turmeric in white rice, adding flavor to the ordinary.”

Lowji Discovers America (Atheneum, 2005) is a delightful early-chapter book that will have readers hoping that Ms. Fleming writes a sequel or two.