Read it like a movie

If a book is a vast world, its trailer is a window that lets a sneak peek. Though book trailers have been in vogue for a long time in the international publishing scenario, it reached India quite recently. The trend quickly became a rage among Indian English authors and readers. Writers like Chetan Bhagat, Amish Tripathi, Swapna Rajput and Aswin Sanghi utilised this provision to reach out to their audience. The trailer of Chetan’s latest book The Girl in the room 105 garnered more than 1 million views.

Adding to the list is a trailer from Kerala for the book The Shadow of the Steam Engine, written by Vestin Verghese. While many use animated characters for trailers, the author’s team has made the trailer with real actors.

“It was the author’s idea to have a trailer for his adventure book. We went through the book and took one interesting part to make the trailer,” says Favour Francis, who directed the trailer.“The book is about two children who lost their home to tsunami. They find shelter in an abandoned steam engine, which is home to an evil spirit. The engine has a secret in it. We have taken that part for the trailer,” he adds.

Jimmy Ronald, Sreehari Kailas and Swalha Fathima appear in prominent roles in the trailer. The narration is by Alpha Shefeek. Favour says the whole process was a challenge. “For movie trailers, they just have to choose from the existing footages and compile them. In this case, we had to make it from scratch.”

The team is happy that the trailer has been widely accepted. “We zeroed in on this concept as our target audience is young readers who are used to Harry Potter trailers and movies and spend time on the internet. We found this as an ideal idea to reach out to them. And, it worked well. The trailer got good views and shares on social media platforms. By the time Sashi Tharoor MP launched the book, people were aware of it,” explains Favour.

The trend is yet to find a space in Malayalam literature, feels Favour. “I had suggested this idea three years ago for a Malayalam book, but couldn’t execute that.  It still has not created any presence in Malayalam. It is not an easy task; it’s a collective effort. The Shadow of the Steam Engine is an English novel. We hope this trailer will inspire regional writers to opt for this style,” he concludes.