The Story of Mango

Children ask where things come from. This book takes one they already like and answers properly.

What Is in It

The mango has been grown in the Asian subcontinent for four thousand years, there are around four hundred varieties worldwide, and a mango tree can live for a century. The fruit carries a full range of vitamins, strengthens the bones and improves general health.

All of that arrives inside a story rather than as a list — a drawing competition among schoolchildren, which is how Dr. Riaz keeps a young reader through what is, underneath, a lesson in botany and nutrition.

The Lessons Underneath

Two things are taught alongside the fruit. The dua for traveling, and the manners of eating — both introduced where they naturally occur in the story rather than appended at the end.

And the frame the whole book sits in: that a mango is a blessing from Allah, deliberately made, and that noticing it is part of gratitude. A child who learns to see an ordinary fruit that way has learned something that transfers.

Related Reading

• The Story of Pomegranate — the companion volume, on the pomegranate
• Etiquette of Eating and Drinking — the manners of eating and drinking, in full
• Kindness to Animals — kindness toward the rest of Allah's creation