ROAR by Varsha Bajaj, Penguin Random House/Nancy Paulsen Books, May 2026, 192p., ISBN: 978-0-593-69905-8

“Deep in the jungle where the mighty tiger lies

Bill and his elephants were taken by surprise”

– Lennon & McCartney “The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill” (1968) 

“A hundred years ago, in 1924, there were approximately 100,000 tigers in the wild.

By 2010, this magnificent species was almost driven to extinction, with only an estimated 3,200 tigers in the wild.

Fortunately, in reaction to this precipitous drop in numbers, the governments of the thirteen tiger-hosting countries came together for the first time at the St. Petersburg Tiger Summit in 2010. The conference was called Tx2–’tiger times two.’ With the World Wildlife Fund as a partner, they made a commitment to double the number of wild tigers by 2022, which was the next Chinese Year of the Tiger.

They may not have met their goal, but they made significant improvements. In September 2023, the global Tiger Forum estimated that there were 5,574 tigers in the wild.”

– from the Author’s Note

“Arya knew it was time. Small pangs of pain started in the late afternoon and intensified as the sky turned violet. She returned to the cave among the rocks. A dense canopy of trees shielded her. She lay down in the pile of leaves that she’d scooped out.

Crow, an owl, and a few monkeys kept watch from the high branches of the trees while the insects played their music. The dark of the night was lit only by stars and Venus shining above.”

Rohan (Ro), an 11-year-old Texas boy, is bummed out by the decreased parental attention he (the long-time only child) is receiving–thanks to his noisy, rambunctious twin baby sibs. Fortunately, he gets an unexpected opportunity to leave it all behind and travel halfway around the world as an unaccompanied minor, in order to visit his grandparents in India. His G-pa works in a nearby tiger sanctuary, the sanctuary where Arya has just birthed her twin cubs. Also traveling to G-ma’s and G-pa’s is Ro’s cousin Mira, who lives a few hours away from their grandparents. 

The cousins will become great friends as they spend quality time in the sanctuary, including getting to see Arya and the cubs. Through these exciting experiences, the cousins will become passionate, engaged, and knowledgeable advocates for the welfare of the big cats.

The primary human conflict in the story involves G-pa’s campaign to prevent a corporation from beginning to mine raw materials nearby, which is bound to negatively impact the sanctuary’s inhabitants. 

G-pa’s fight for the tigers–aided by Ro’s and Mira’s participation in the action, and Ro’s mom’s long-distance help with the legal paperwork–exposes middle grade readers to the serious, sometimes deadly threats (like poachers) faced by these amazing and endangered wild creatures. 

Ro and Mira’s story periodically yields to naturalistic chapters in which we hang out with Arya and learn lots about tigers and tiger moms. We also meet Crow, Arya’s sharp best friend, who will come through when the chips are down.

ROAR is an excellent read. Despite the depiction of the sometimes intense and tragic results of nature’s food chain processes, ROAR is a relatively quick read, with short chapters. Apart from possibly being a bit challenging for younger readers to thoroughly understand  the ins and outs of the issues pitting the conservationists against the business interests, ROAR is a good one for hooking young readers who are working their way into chapter books. The excitement of meeting these majestic creatures halfway around the world, (and maybe even picking up some of Ro and Mira’s passion for protecting tigers) is the sort of stuff that can make reading habit-forming

I’d particularly encourage third, fourth, and fifth grade teachers to add a copy to their classroom collections.

Richie Partington, MLIS

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