How to Stop Your Grownup From Making Bad Decisions

By Judy Balan

Nina has questions. Somebody had better have the answers.

Nina has questions. Are moms just little girls who are taller and wear prettier shoes? Can I call pest control services to get rid of a pesky seven-year-old boy? What if my sister is a voodoo high priestess? Is a grownup refusing to grow up the same as someone pretending to be asleep? Are teachers not allowed to admit they're wrong? WHO. LEFT. PARENTS. IN. CHARGE? Somebody had better have the answers. Big announcement: Nina's mom is going to marry Dhiraj! He's not the wicked stepfather by any stretch of the imagination. He's much, much worse. He's a rapper! And a bad one at that. And his rapper name is Dhiraj Fist aka Diddy Blood. Case rested. After all, dumb is the new wicked. Nina must stop this catastrophe, but she's going to need co-conspirators. With her sister Nikki, who seems to keep disappearing mysteriously, and her mother's best friend, Ashwin Uncle, who's now fighting with her mother, Nina must find a way to save her favourite grownup from making a really bad decision. Because, really, grownups just can't be trusted to make good life choices. As sweet as it is funny, Nina the Philosopher is a brilliant, witty, thought-provoking series that tells the story of a modern-day fairy tale: a single mother and her two wonderful, hilariously angst-ridden daughters. It's The Princess Diaries for a new generation. Except, you know, without a princess. Or a diary. The book is beautifully designed and illustrated by a remarkably talented new artist, Priyanka Shyam. Check out Nina's blog at www.ninathephilosopher.com. Also check out the book trailer at http://youtu.be/tkopFMFnHCM.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Harper
• Release date: Jan 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9789351369981

Judy Balan

Judy Balan is the overthinking parent of an overthinking child. Reality overwhelms her at times, which is why she enjoys making stuff up. She loves reading, watching and writing comedy. How to Stop Your Grownup from Making Bad Decisions was her first attempt at writing for non-grownups. She enjoyed it so much she decided to make it a series and call it Nina the Philosopher because tweens who think deserve their own series. For more on Judy and her writing, hop over to judybalan.com or check out Nina's blog ninathephilosopher.com.

Book preview

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WWW.NINATHEPHILOSOPHER.COM

(Disclaimer: I sometimes stop in the middle of a story and continue later because I get interrupted a LOT!)

Hello. I’m Nina. I’m eleven years old and have a lot of questions. Like, why does my mom (she doesn’t like to be called ‘Amma’) keep reading books with titles like How to Kindle Your Child’s Curiosity and then cover her ears and skip around the house screaming ‘Aiyo, Nina, stop asking so many questions!’? Then my grandmom (my mom’s mom) butts in and tells her to stop saying ‘aiyo’ because something bad always happens every time someone says that word. Then my mom tells her that it’s so silly and that she shouldn’t believe everything people say.

My Very Own Voldemort:

Mrs Pooja Dixit aka Poo-jar Dig-shit

Posted by Nina on 12 February 2014 5.12 p.m.

On Tuesday, Mrs Pooja Dixit (she always makes us call her by her full name, because the whole class once wished her ‘Good morning, Mrs Dig-shit’) told us in class that magic existed and that she was trained by a professional magician. I asked her to show us a trick or two and she went with the card trick. The card trick. Which even seven-year-olds know is complete hogwash. Why do teachers think children are stupid?

But everyone in my class was fascinated with the ‘magic’. Except Akaash. He kept going, ‘I know this trick! I know this trick!’ and Mrs Dig-shit got angry and scolded him for ruining the trick for the rest of the class. Yeah, right. I don’t understand. Why was she telling the class that it was magic when it clearly wasn’t? She said a ‘real magician’ taught her to do that. So I told her she should not believe everything people say. What is wrong with that? That’s what Mom said to Grandma. But Mrs Dig-shit lost it and said that I always ‘back-answer’ and don’t know how to talk to my elders.

She asked me to say sorry and I said, ‘But Ma’am, I don’t know why you’re angry. Is it because I know that your card trick is not real magic?’

‘Are you telling me that you won’t say sorry?’ she said. And many lines appeared on her forehead.

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When I say Pooja, you’re picturing someone thin and sweet, yes? But she’s not like that. She’s more like an Indian version of that Dolores Umbridge lady from Harry Potter. She wears an enormous bindi and glasses and is tall and heavily built. Even her voice is kind of like a man’s voice. But she comes to school every day riding a yellow Scooty Pep. We all think that scooter is too tiny for her and that one day it might give way and break while she’s perched on it in the middle of slow traffic. Anyway. Back to my story.

‘But Ma’am, we should only say sorry when we mean it, right?’ I said. Because that’s what Ashwin Uncle told me. And it made so much sense. I like Ashwin Uncle. I’ll tell you more about him later. My sister Nikki wants to look at vampires on the computer now. Gah.

Ashwin Uncle, My Superman

Posted by Nina on 12 February 2014 at 7.15 p.m.

Hello again! Nikki’s gone out, so I’ll have the laptop to myself for a good long time. I was telling you about Ashwin Uncle, yes? He’s my mom’s friend and he’s extremely fond of me.

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He’s actually more like MY friend. And he loves answering my questions. But Mom gets upset with him sometimes. Because he lets me do whatever I want, according to my mom. Then they fight about it. And my mom always says, ‘But what do you know about parenting? Have you taken care of a gold fish in your life?’ and Ashwin Uncle gets annoyed and leaves. But that’s okay. He always returns in a few days to see me. I love him. I think my dad would have been like him. But I’m not sure.

I Feel Like Nemo Sometimes :(

I’m not like my mom at all (except for my beady eyes, smile, long arms and wavy hair). So I think I must be like my dad but my mom says my dad was ‘one mental case only’. But according to my mom, everybody is a mental case. So I can’t take her too seriously. And yeah, my parents are divorced. That means they don’t like each other anymore so they live in separate houses. But I haven’t seen my dad at all. Like, he left before I was even born. Mom doesn’t like to talk about it. Even my sister Nikki says she doesn’t remember him. But please, she was almost four years old when he left, so how can she not remember? Anyway, Mom says I can do whatever I want after I turn eighteen. So I’m going to find my dad as soon as I’m old enough. Ashwin Uncle has promised to help me find him. Yesss!

Diddy Blood, Nikki and Polka Dot

(yes, they are all real people)

Posted by Nina on 12 February 2014 at 9.02 p.m.

My mom has a boyfriend – Dhiraj. She keeps saying ‘he’s just a friend’ but please, I’m a smart girl and I KNOW. I even saw them kissing once, like people kiss on the shows my sister watches. Mom said, ‘No, no, he was just blowing out the dust from my eyes.’ That was a stupid thing to say, because the eyes are on the top of the face and the lips are right at the bottom. Anyway. I don’t want to talk about it. Eww, I want to puke.

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Dhiraj is nice, but he’s stunted. I mean mentally. He braids his hair and wears a silver bangle. My mom thinks he’s really advanced though. She likes to tell everyone what he does. He’s a social media expert. That means he keeps tweeting everything that’s happening around him and goes about adding ‘funny’ comments to everybody’s Facebook status updates. I don’t understand how this can be a job. I’ve been using Google since I was three and I even have a secret Facebook account AND this blog with 103 followers.

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Maybe I’m a social media expert too and I don’t know it. Oh, and that’s not the worst of it. He’s a social media expert by day and a rapper by night. No, I don’t think you heard me. He’s a RAPPER! At least that’s what he thinks he is. He doesn’t even speak like normal people. Like, if he sees me, he goes, ‘Yo-yo-yo-Nini-kins-didju-mommy-go-to-vatican!’ I mean, what IS that? He even has a rapper name: Dhiraj Fist a.k.a Diddy Blood (!!!)

My sister Nikki is fourteen and she likes Dhiraj more than Ashwin Uncle, I think. But then, she also likes vampires, so I can’t take her seriously. She keeps saying that I have to be older to like vampires (Whaaaaat?). Sometimes I don’t understand if she’s too dumb for her age or if I’m too smart for my age.

Plus, Dhiraj has this little monster of a son. He’s this pesky little kid who is always pulling my hair or messing with my stuff or destroying something in the house. And you know what he calls him? Polka Dot. POLKA DOT! I think he was aiming for POLTERGEIST but couldn’t spell it. And Mom says I must be nice to him because he’s younger than me. This is another rule that completely goes over my head. If I have to be nice to people simply because they are younger than me and listen to people simply because they are older than me, then whom can I NOT like? Anyway. I don’t know what my mom sees in that Dhiraj.

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I love my mom, though. In case you think I hate her because I’m complaining so much about her. I just don’t understand her. She loses her mind over the most insignificant things and yells the house down. Then she comes back to me in a few minutes and kisses me till I feel like I’m going to die of being kissed too much. What is that?

Drama at School

Posted by Nina on 13 February 2014 at 10.33 a.m.

I completely lost track of what I was talking about! This happens a LOT, by the way. But back to my Tuesday story. Mrs Dig-shit got angry with me for not saying sorry and ‘talking back to your elders’. She called my mom over to school and there was a lot of drama. I thought my mom would come and explain to her that I was right, you know? Because she’s the one who told me that people shouldn’t believe everything they hear. But my mom was also teaming up with Dig-shit and scowling at me. She told the teacher she was sorry and that she didn’t know what to do with me and in the end both of them became friends and kept laughing. I was irritated, but I also found it strange, because Mrs Dig-shit only wears stiff cotton sarees and her hair is always neat and oiled and she doesn’t like women who wear jeans. My mom was wearing jeans AND her hair was tied in a messy knot as always AND she was wearing her sunglasses on her head. Dig-shit HATES that. She always says ‘Why do people wear sunglasses on their heads? What kind of style is that?’ So I