The year is 2048, but the world is not the one Sam knows. Trapped within pages that breathe and bleed, he has to face the nefarious Wordsmith. Will Sam rewrite destiny, or be erased forever.
That is the engine of The Battle for Bookworld, Samarth Girotra's debut novel, published in 2025. It is adventure and fantasy, and it is built by someone who clearly thinks for a living.
A book about books, by a debater
Samarth is 16, from Noida, and a fixture of the debating and Model UN circuit, where he has argued everything from climate policy to intergalactic conflict. It shows. A villain who attacks the world by rewriting its words is the kind of idea a debater finds irresistible, and Samarth follows it with real precision.
He is also one of our most prolific young authors, with work in the Hopscotch and Whispers of Many Worlds anthologies as well as this solo novel.
What a full novel asks of a teenager
An anthology story is a sprint. A novel is a different sport. It asks a young writer to hold a world in their head for months, to keep a plot coherent across a whole book, and to finish. Samarth finished.
The Battle for Bookworld is on Amazon and in stores. If you have a teenager who argues for fun and reads like it is oxygen, hand them this and watch what they think they could do next.
