The Room on the Roof is a timeless coming-of-age novel that will resonate with a whole new generation of readers. Written by renowned author Ruskin Bond when he was just seventeen, it is the story of Rusty, a teenage Anglo-Indian boy who is orphaned and has to live with his English guardian in the stifling European quarter of Dehra Dun. Unhappy with the strict ways of his guardian, Rusty runs away from home to live with his Indian friends into the dream-bright world of the bazaar, Hindu festivals and all manner of Indian life. Rusty is enthralled, and is lost forever to the prim proprieties of the claustrophic European community.

 

 

This book is part of a book series called The Originals .

This book has been graded for interest at 11-15 years.

There are 208 pages in this book.

It is aimed at Young Adult readers. The term Young Adult (YA) is used for books which have the following characteristics: (1) aimed at ages 12-18 years, US grades 7-12, UK school years 8-15, (2) around 50-75k words long, (3) main character is aged 12-18 years, (4) topics include self-reflection, internal conflict vs external, analyzing life and its meaning, (5) point of view is often in the first person, and (6) swearing, violence, romance and sexuality are allowed.

This book was published in 2017 by Penguin Random House Children's UK .

Born in Kasauli (Himachal Pradesh) in 1934, Ruskin Bond grew up in Jamnagar (Gujarat), Dehradun, New Delhi and Simla. His first novel, The Room on the Roof, written when he was seventeen, received the John Llewellyn Rhys Memorial Prize in 1957. Since then he has written over 500 short stories, essays and novellas (including Vagrants in the Valley and A Flight of Pigeons) and more than forty books for children. He received the Sahitya Akademi Award for English writing in India in 1993, the Padma Shri in 1999, and the Delhi government's Lifetime Achievement Award in 2012. He lives in Landour, Mussoorie, with his extended family.