Are the problems of the Indians who worry you ?

You probably didn't read Averchenko as a child (of course! No one wanted to publish the author of a collection called "A Dozen Knives in the Back of the Revolution"!), but now it's really, really worth reading! His stories most of all resemble, perhaps, Zoshchenko's children's stories: roughly the same background - pre-revolutionary Russia, rather caustic, sarcastic humor, sharp language and apt expressions.

The heroes of the stories are schoolchildren (mostly slackers, but interesting, talented, and dexterous slackers). Sometimes they pull off completely unbelievable commercial operations (for example, they gradually exchange a brand-new bicycle for a chocolate bar. Or they spend a ruble honestly (not quite;)) earned through poetry to beat up the main bully at school). Sometimes they behave like all of us once did: they distract the teacher during class because the whole class is not prepared and they need to stall for time; or, offended by their parents, they imagine how they will take revenge on them with their sudden death. There are also scenes from an exemplary boyish childhood - with evening swims in the river, playing pirates, tomahawks, campfires, fish soup, Indian feathers.

But smoking and even drinking alcohol are also found here. And rude words (censored, of course, but!). And there are methods of education that now seem unacceptable. If you can close your eyes to all this, then you will probably like the stories, laugh heartily, and use apt expressions. Children can be given from the age of 10.

Here lots of humor.