Michigan author Pria Dee is no stranger to the way the members of small communities support each other and help children thrive. As a child, she grew up in a city in India, but she had relatives who lived in small villages and towns like the one featured in her picture book Balu Saves the Day. In places like that, “Everyone knew everyone else,” she explains, continuing, “Though I was only a child at the time, I remember vividly the vibrant colors and simplicity of village life.”

That sense of a small, tightknit community is core to the story of Balu Saves the Day. Too young for school, Balu goes to the market every day with his mother, where they sell fresh vegetables. But one day, when his mother gets sick, Balu has to take charge, first fetching the doctor and then medicine, exchanging these goods and services for payment in vegetables. Those successes give Balu an idea, and he returns to the market to sell vegetables on his own. When he explains to the other vendors that his mother is ill, everyone comes together to help out:

The other vendors overheard them talking and smiled. They had a plan. Together, they gathered and packaged a basket of tamarind rice, steaming hot idlis with lentil sambhar and coconut chutney. They even added some crispy vadas and gulab jamuns! Balu’s favorite! 

“Please take this food in exchange for your vegetables,” the vendors told Balu. “Go home to your mother now.”

Through Balu’s optimistic efforts and the community’s help, Balu does save the day and returns home to a mother feeling much better. Kirkus Reviews considers the story an “enjoyable, upbeat tale” featuring “an independent boy whose hard work and concern for his family are rewarded by an understanding community.” 

Dee’s depiction of the community setting draws on her childhood memories, but the direct inspiration for Balu’s tale came from a news story during the pandemic. “There was a particularly moving story about a girl in India who carried her disabled father on a bicycle over 700 miles,” Dee recalls. “She was hailed as a hero.” The article made Dee consider how many children might be doing similar things for their families—“how many other unsung young heroes there may be.” While Balu’s tale isn’t as dramatic, taking on the adult role of selling in the marketplace and being brave enough to offer vegetables in exchange for medicine and a doctor’s services, these actions are a huge accomplishment for a 5-year-old. “I wanted children to know that while they may be young, they can still help others,” Dee says, “and to be aware that the lives of children in other countries are very different from their own.”

Many young American readers might have trouble imagining being allowed to work a market stall as a small child. But for children in small villages in India, Dee explains, it’s not so unthinkable. “Children growing [up] in small communities in India are often integrated into the profession of their parents,” she shares. “For example, a farmer’s child may have to help with milking the cows after school. Or a pottery maker’s daughter may have to help decorate the clay pots on the weekends. Most children are encouraged to help their parents with chores around the house.” 

Some of those ideas may not be such a stretch for young American children who do their own chores or help in a family’s garden or on a family farm. Picture books and nonfiction articles often feature familiar American childhood fundraisers, like lemonade stands, and those tales also helped Dee shape her story. “I have often admired the ingenuity of children who try to earn money to buy a coveted toy by raking leaves or setting the table,” Dee recalls, but in Balu’s case, the stakes are much higher than a toy.

It was important to Dee to show that children can use their own resourcefulness to help adults in their time of need. Balu has a tremendous amount of agency in the picture book, taking on the role of caretaker for his sick mother. That depiction can help young readers to feel empowered, to know that they can save the day. But the story also shows that there is help when they need it and that children can ask trusted people to support them.

Dee references the African proverb of taking a village to raise a child, explaining, “I wanted this concept to be a key part of Balu’s story. Balu is an intelligent child…so he steps up. However, he realizes that he is not alone and the people in his community are kind and care about him and his mother, and he happily accepts their help. This makes Balu’s story one of hope in the goodness of neighbors.” Dee blends that moral in as a part of her story without making it too obvious a lesson, likening writing for children to using the story as a spoonful of sugar, per the Mary Poppins song, to deliver a message.

Balu Saves the Day is her second collaboration with illustrator YoungJu Kim, whose watercolor art on a woodgrain background brings Dee’s rough sketches to life. “I especially love to see the personalities of the children in my books come through in the expressions she captures,” Dee shares. Making a book, like caring for a family or growing up in a small town, also takes a community. As for Dee’s next project, she looks to her own community and surroundings: the wildlife and nature of “beautiful Michigan.” Readers will be unsurprised if Dee’s work continues to show the vibrance and simplicity—and interconnectivity—Balu’s adventure reveals.

Alana Joli Abbott writes about pop culture, fantasy and science fiction, and children’s books, which she reviews with the help of her kids.