From award-winning Mexican author Ricardo Chávez Castañeda and the visionary Mexican designer Alejandro Magallanes comes a horror story and ghost story that is both daringly and beautifully told in word and image.
There are stories so terrible that we tremble to hear even a whisper of them. Even more terrible, some of them are true.This is one such story, a story of our deepest inhumanity—one that confronts the history of violence against children, and through its young narrator attempts to find a way out. A horror story and ghost story told as much through art as through text, The Book of Denial is an antidote to our collective silence. By uplifting storytelling as a means of understanding the past and shaping the future, it is also—improbably—a beacon of hope.
Written by genre-defying Mexican author Ricardo Chávez Castañeda, The Book of Denial is a dark and powerful story within a story, illustrated with a striking graphic sensibility by Alejandro Magallanes and translated by Lawrence Schimel.
This is the third book to appear under Unruly, an imprint of picture books for older readers, and will include a short note to readers about how it continues to build this experimental framework of visually complex, sophisticated picture books for teens and adults.
Praise
A Kirkus Reviews Best Book for Teens Out this Week!
STARRED REVIEW! ? “In this innovative work by noted Mexican creators that’s translated from Spanish, … the story propels readers inexorably toward its shocking climax. Striking black-and-white illustrations in a variety of styles, including photography and graphic design, frequently incorporate lines of text into the art and heighten the emotional impact. Unforgettable.”
—Kirkus
RECOMMENDED WITH SPECIAL DISTINCTION! ? “By no means an easy read, this manages to be deeply insightful and endlessly horrifying… The startling black-and-white art of Magallanes’s illustrations adds an entirely new layer of gruesomeness, each page a unique and disturbing piece of art: a necktie made of a skeletal hand, a silhouette of a tumbling and mangled child, or a doll squeezed tightly by a shadowy hand.”
—Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books
“An artful blend of typography, photos, and illustration on each page pulls the reader in deeper, despite the oppressive air of menace: 'Is there anyone more killable than a child?' This shocking, mournful record and darkly attractive art object is designed to haunt.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Not to be missed… Groundbreaking writer Chávez Castañeda and award-winning illustrator and graphic designer Magallanes, both from Mexico, are the forces behind this explosive, visually engaging work. The bold design and the dramatic, limited palette lend additional impact to the story of a boy attempting to make sense of a world in which children are the victims of horrific adult cruelty.”
—Laura Simeon, Young Readers' Editor, Kirkus Reviews
Featured in Psychopomp’s “15 SFFH Books We’re Looking Forward to in January 2024!”
“After reading an excerpt of just a few pages, I cannot wait for the whole thing. The Book of Denial is written by Mexican author Ricardo Chávez Castañeda and is ‘a horror story and ghost story that is both daringly and beautifully told in word and image… that confronts the history of violence against children, and through its young narrator attempts to find a way out.’ It might (somewhat simplistically) be described as a horror-picture book, where the writing is intimately intertwined with striking and profoundly evocative illustrations by Alejandro Magallanes. On every page, story and words blend with typography, art, and photos.”
—Maria Haskins, for Psychopomp
