Delighted, says Ruskin Bond on joining Twitter

New Delhi, Jan 23: Noted author Ruskin Bond, who has kept himself aloof from social networking sites like Facebook, has finally opened an account on Twitter. "Hello world, Delighted to be on Twitter," wrote the 81-year-old writer in his first tweet.

Bond, who has written over 500 short stories, essays and novellas and more than 40 books for children, has said most of his initial stories were fictional narratives of actual experiences.

"A lot of my earlier stories are actual experiences, characters, experiences and situations, which I then turned into fictional narratives," he said earlier at the ongoing Jaipur Literature Festival.

Bond is an author associated with publisher Penguin Random House, who announced at the literary festival, its partnership with Twitter India to introduce its Twitter Books vertical in the country.

"In an increasingly digital world, the online space has fast become the most effective way of discovering books and authors," Gaurav Shrinagesh, CEO Penguin Random House India said in a statement. "We already have the largest digital footprint and engaged social media communities in the region but are delighted to now be working with Twitter India and their new books vertical to broaden this audience further," he said.

A number of its other authors, including Shobhaa De, Amitav Ghosh, Ravinder Singh, Durjoy Datta, Mohammed Hanif, Devdutt Pattanaik, Bibek Debroy and K R Meera have also become the first authors to be verified within the new books vertical.

Meru Gokhale, Editor-in-Chief, Literary Publishing, has been the first publisher to be verified, the publishers said. Through the Twitter Books vertical, the publishing house said it "will work closely with its writers to maximise the opportunities the platform presents, both in terms of written content and video through Vine and Periscope, to engage in even more real-time conversations with readers, and potential readers."

PTI