Soha Ali Khan, Kunal Kemmu to co-author children book series for Penguin Random House

Penguin Random House India (PRHI) on Thursday announced the acquisition of a series of picture books from actor-couple Soha Ali Khan and Kunal Kemmu. To be published under Penguin’s ‘‘Puffin’’ imprint, the series, consisting of three picture books, is tentatively titled Inni and Bobo. The first book of the series will be released next year, they said. A story about a little child finding friendship and the beauty of adopting dogs, the Inni and Bobo series would help young readers learn about empathy along with some other “imperative life lessons” and more. Soha and Kunal, who are parents to daughter Inaaya Naumi Kemmu, said one of the things their three-year-old always looks forward to is listening to stories. “One of Inaaya’s favourite things to do is story time — either she’ll bring a book to one of us and ask us to read it to her whilst she looks at the pictures, or then as she says ‘‘from your mouth’’ where she chooses the characters and the setting and we make up the story for her. Often the story is about her and an animal because she loves animals - all animals without discrimination, but perhaps being partial to dogs because of Masti. So, we started telling her stories about a little girl called Inni and her dog,” said the couple in a statement. “She loved the stories and then asked to see the pictures and that’s when we came up with the idea of writing a series of books about Inni — based on Inaaya - and Bobo,” they added. While Soha her writing debut in 2017 with her memoirs The Perils of Being Moderately Famous, the upcoming book will be Kunal’s maiden title as an author. According to the publishers, the truly “endearing story” will touch the hearts of all — children, their guardians, and animal lovers. “I am absolutely thrilled that Soha and Kunal’s beautiful picture books have found a home at Puffin. I hope these gorgeously illustrated picture books find a special place on every young reader’s bookshelf. And we are also so very excited to welcome Kunal to the Penguin Random House family as a new author,” said Arpita Nath, associate commissioning editor, PRHI.