"A modern classic, that once read will nerver be forgotten. The message in this book can shape all our future's into a better place.."

On the 26th March 1985, a train pulled out of Central Station in Bombay and headed into the night and the foothills of the Western Ghats mountains of Maharashtra State, India. Three days later it arrived in Madras, far to the south. On board were hundreds of people and one of them entertained some of his fellow passengers by telling a story - 'The Heartstone Odyssey'. By the end of the journey, he had been given a new name and nothing was ever quite the same again.

The passenger told his companions an epic tale which spanned two hundred years and touched on the deepest and sometimes most sensitive elements of the relationship between India and Britain. The story was introduced as being for children and it has been they who have taken what became a book, most to their hearts. In that first telling though, it moved many adults, as it has done ever since, opening up experiences that some had never found a way to talk about before

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The storyteller thought he was passing the time of the journey but his audience had other ideas. One of them, Sitakumari, became the leading figure in seeing that the story was published. Another gave the storyteller a name to present the book under, Arvan Kumar. This is not strictly an Indian name but it means 'Horse Messenger of the Moon' and anyone who reads the book will realise where the idea came from.

Once published, 'The Heartstone Odyssey' was taken up by its real followers, the now tens of thousands of children and young people who have taken it to their hearts in countries across the world. Many heard the story in groups, often in school. It was what they did that gave birth to Heartstone as a young people's organisation.

The story addressed prejudice and even hatred. The young people, however, wanted not just to put these things behind them but to replace them with something else, something real. They started schemes, they sponsored endangered animals, they raised money to help people in difficulty, they wrote charters that they hoped would be taken up in their schools. One group of primary school children in London even took it on themselves to make so much of a fuss with the local council that a special programme was launched to clean off all the racist graffiti in the area. The children though did something more. They contacted Allied Mouse, the organisation that had been set up to publish the book, to ask if there were any other children like them doing similar things and to ask if they could be put in touch. Heartstone was born.

So no one planned Heartstone, it came into being because its time had come. One individual made up a story with the intention of telling it to the person he was travelling with. What actually happened was that he ended up with an audience of tens of people. Through the perseverance of a few of those combined with help from many more, a story that was to have just been told for fun became a published book. Now what had happened was because of hundreds, not tens of individuals. Next, the book was taken up by thousands - parents, teachers, libraries and children on their own. Thus, the published story because of them took on a life. It was the children together though who took the next step. Only because of them, literally in their tens of thousands, something happened. It came to be called 'Heartstone' and all because one person thought he was telling a story to ease a long journey in the heat of the start of a summer one year in India!

When 'The Heartstone Odyssey' was first published, a reviewer wrote:

"The greatest strength of the book is in another area which has been sadly neglected by other children's authors. The story describes a world in which there exists a powerful and well co-ordinated anti-racist movement - much more powerful, that is, than many a young victim of racism is likely to be aware of today. This is something that we are all striving for, but the vision in the meantime, will provide a source of strength and encouragement to many of our children."

Heartstone Odyssey