About ilmbee

Made slowly,
on purpose.

One family wanted a book they could hand over without checking it first. Now there are a hundred: sourced, checked, drawn by hand.

  • Every line sourced
  • Drawn by hand
  • Read aloud first

How this started

It began as one family looking for something to read with their children after Maghrib, and turned into a much longer project than any of us planned.

We started the way most parents do, with a search. What came back was either far too advanced, visibly recycled from somewhere else, or wrapped in adverts we did not want anywhere near a five year old. The few good books we found were scattered, with no sense of what came first and what came after.

So we built the shelf we had been looking for. One hundred books, in a deliberate order, illustrated from scratch and checked against the sources before anything was drawn. Whether you are opening the very first book or working through the last ten, ilmbee is meant to be the place a child grows into rather than out of.

We were not trying to start a company. We were trying to find one book that we could hand over without checking it first.
Javid Ahmed Khateeb, Founder

The process

How one book
gets made.

Five stages, always in this order. Most of what goes wrong in children's Islamic publishing is drawing before checking.

  1. 01 · Sourced

    The ayah comes first

    We agree what the book teaches and where it comes from. No source, no book.

  2. 02 · Written

    One idea per spread

    Short sentences, concrete words, nothing a child can’t picture.

  3. 03 · Reviewed

    Checked before it’s drawn

    Checked against the source. Nothing is illustrated until it’s clean.

  4. 04 · Illustrated

    Drawn for this book only

    Every spread drawn from scratch. No stock, no generated art, no reuse.

  5. 05 · Read aloud

    Tested on a child

    Read to a child first. If they stumble, the sentence goes back.

What we're for

Easier to trust a company
that says what it won't do.

Every line below is checkable. If we break one, you'll be able to point at it.

We will never

  • Publish a sentence we can't trace to the Qur'an or an authenticated hadith.
  • Use generated or stock artwork in a book and call it illustration.
  • Build streaks or notifications that pressure a child into opening the app.
  • Sell, rent or share anything about your family with anyone.
  • Make cancelling harder than subscribing was.
  • Put a price in front of you before you've read something.

We will always

  • Print the source on the page, where you and your child can both see it.
  • Keep every book in order, so each one builds on the last.
  • Let you read three complete books before you pay anything.
  • Answer email from a person, in a working day or two.
  • Refund you within 30 days for any reason, without an argument.
  • Tell you plainly when we've got something wrong, and fix it.

By the numbers

What one hundred
actually costs.

0
Books in Series 01
0
Illustrated pages
0
Quiz questions
0
Stock images

Every page sourced, checked, drawn by hand and read aloud before it ships. That is where the years went.

The people

Small, and that's
rather the point.

Nobody here is a content pipeline. Every book passes through the same few pairs of hands.

  • Javid Ahmed Khateeb

    Founder & Director

  • Sheikh Abu Omar Parvez Nakwa

    Umrī  ·  Madanī

    Co-Director

  • Ahmed Raza

    Partner

  • Abdullah Ashraf

    CGO & CTO

Reviewed for accuracy by Sheikh Abu Omar Parvez Nakwa (Umri, Madani). See how a book gets checked

Start tonight

Judge us by the books.

Everything above is easy to say. The first three books are free, so you can check.

Read Book 1 free Browse all 100