Finishing the last page of Bunny & Tree is like waking from a dream-one you did not want to end. Filled with surreal adventure and magical thinking, Zsako has created a secret world unlike any other, and like all Enchanted Lion books the production is top-notch, produced with attention to every detail. -Lane Smith, Kate Greenaway medalist and Caldecott honoree
Who says a picture book can't go for 180 pages? A child who can sit through an animated movie will be equally captured by this novel-length series of wordless narrative images. Bunny & Tree seems to be written in sentences made of pictures, as short as a few spreads, or in long, extended riffs. With gorgeous washes of gouache for the landscapes (elegant as Steinberg watercolors), obsessive scribbly drawing for the characters inhabiting them (reminiscent of Hockney), and an exquisite quality of production-the printing and the paper-it feels like a book to treasure. My 4-year-old grandson was captivated by the rabbit's heroic quest to find its lost rabbit companions with the help of a staggeringly imaginative tree. His verdict: 'Read it again!' Bunny & Tree will reward little children for its story, adults for its art, and everyone for its buoyant spirit. -Paul Zelinsky, Caldecott medalist
Balint Zsako is a Publishers Weekly Spring 2023 Flying Start!
Bunny & Tree (Enchanted Lion) is a wordless hand-painted picture book nearly 200 pages long that overflows with conceptual fireworks and deep emotion... The idea to tell a story in paintings grew out of nightly sessions with his young son Gus as he read him classic picture books. 'Even the most sophisticated books depend on language,' he says. 'Out of curiosity, I asked myself: Can I be as sophisticated telling stories with pictures only?' ... Now Zsako is waiting to see how children respond to Bunny & Tree. 'I'm super curious,' he says. 'It's such a puzzle. Kids have the capacity and even a hunger for the unusual and unexpected...' As an artist, he's gratified by another benefit offered by the picture book. 'To make something that somebody can look at, at their own speed, in a place that's safe to them-there's something really appealing about that.' -Publishers Weekly, Flying Start
Presented in 11 short sections, Balint Zsako's elegant and stylized pictures tell a sweet, fantastical story of lost and found... Bunny & Tree is an endearing and uplifting adventure, with emotional delicacy and artwork that brims with humor and possibility. It would be a lovely book to take to a shaded hammock on a sunny afternoon. -Wall Street Journal
In every true friendship, each is the other's savior, over and over. That is what Hungarian artist Balint Zsako explores with great subtlety and sweetness in Bunny & Tree-a strange and wondrous wordless picture book about a bunny saved from the archetypal hungry wolf by an unlikely savior-a sentient tree-and the unlikely friendship that blooms between them... Against Zsako's exquisite watercolor skyscapes, ... the story ends with a lovely wordless meditation on friendship, community, and the unstoppable ongoingness of life. A tender wordless parable of friendship and the improbable saviors that make life livable. -Maria Popova, The Marginalian
Imaginative power and constant movement make this wordless debut picture book from artist Zsako a visual tour de force... Atmospheric backdrops create the sense of passing time as the journey hurtles onward. The page-turning tale mixes classic storytelling tropes-the ability to transform, a quest for lost loved ones, trees' majesty-into a fanciful exploration of a world in which love leads to growth, and growth, in turn, to deeper love. -Publishers Weekly, STARRED REVIEW
The feel of this narrative is classic, but the presentation makes it new, wondrous even, as it is entirely wordless. Color-soaked, full-page illustrations comprise the entire book, filling it with watercoloresque skies, dramatic silhouettes, and boundless imagination. It subtly tips its hat to Harold and the Purple Crayon and The Runaway Bunny in the ways the duo creatively surmounts obstacles, typically by Tree taking on different shapes suggested by Bunny: a sailboat when met with water, an airplane when confronted with mountains. Zsako also folds in visual cues that speak to nature's life cycles, season changes, and symbiosis. Beyond that, the heartwarming friendship between Bunny and Tree is never once in doubt, and it will effortlessly gather readers into its embrace. -Booklist, STARRED REVIEW
This exquisite wordless book in nine acts visually conveys the story of a friendship between the titular characters Bunny and Tree... Sweeping full-bleed illustrations rely on color to guide the tenor of this tale, with consistent landscape scenes that have the fluid pigment layering of watercolor and the bold saturation of gouache. Zsako brilliantly utilizes speech bubbles containing visually symbolic messages to relay the conversations between Bunny and Tree. The denouement of an emotionally charged climax provides comfort and includes a surprising moment of humor relating to bunny droppings that still suits the story's philosophical tone. Readers with a romantic worldview and keen attentiveness to visual information will find deep solace in this picture book. -The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, RECOMMENDED WITH SPECIAL DISTINCTION
Cooperation, regeneration, and reunification conveyed wordlessly in nine acts... Zsako's depictions of skies and weather are particularly mesmerizing... Zsako avoids anthropomorphism, communicating emotions through body language, not physiognomy. This handsomely bound, rich volume... will intrigue both kids and grown-ups. A lush tale that's worthy of repeat perusals. -Kirkus
Balint Zsako, the Los Angeles-based Canadian artist, began his children's book four years ago by setting a problem for himself. He had been reading storybooks to his three-year-old son and noticed how much they relied on written language to convey the narrative and how closely tied were the pictures to the words. 'As a challenge, I was curious to see if you could get the same nuance and subtlety in the narrative relationships without using words.' The result of his problem-solving is Bunny & Tree, a 184-page story in which the eponymous characters establish a life-saving and generative closeness. The story also involves a brief introduction of a wolf and, more prominently, a family of eight additional rabbits. Except for a few punctuation marks and some thought-balloons with pictographs, Zsako never strays from his wordless plan. This result ends up being worth thousands of words. -Border Crossings
This is a masterpiece of a book, rich with imagination and the most stunning artwork. I ooh-ed and ahh-ed with each page turn and was surprised and delighted along each step of Bunny and Tree's journey. I have followed Balint's work for years because of its beauty and complex conceptual imagery, which shines in this book too. It's a story of friendship, kindness, generosity, regrowth and courage, a truly heartwarming tale we all could benefit from right now. - Illustrator & NYT columnist Julia Rothman
This is an incredibly moving and magical book. I loved it. -NYT bestselling author Sheila Heti
An epic folktale told with the quiet beauty of an illuminated manuscript. Balint Zsako is a visual poet. -Illustrator & designer Nicholas Blechman
I've had the enjoyable experience of reviewing Bunny & Tree with my six-year-old sitting alongside me. We turned page after page as if rolling out a long scrolling allegorical landscape-me falling in love with Balint's beautifully detailed yet charmingly simple paintings and my son excited to see what would happen to Bunny and to his friend and protector the tree (no spoilers here). There are so many surprising lessons in the book about the color and joy of nature, about the act of caring for each other; lovely messages about life, seasons, brotherhood, and protecting each other and the selfless act of giving. Lessons we should all carry with us through our lives, yet sometimes we lose sight of them as we age. The remarkable thing is, the book is pictures alone-there are no words. Yet I never had to explain any part of the book-Balint's method of painting using open landscapes of washes and brushstrokes provides space for the reader to sit with the images and absorb and understand them. Bunny & Tree captures the passage of time in such a unique way-more like telling a story over a long walk. My son and I were led on long a journey together through a poetic allegory-all told using beautifully painted pictures and symbols that my son could fully understand. Stories like these use a magical language that is extremely powerful to children, and leave an imprint on who we are and how we go about the rest of our lives. We all remember reading Where the Wild Things Are or The Giving Tree or perhaps seeing the films of Miyzaki. Bunny and Tree speaks to us in much the same way-silently powerful, charmingly beautiful and forever memorable. I won't ever forget this book. It is a deeply powerful allegory, deceptively simple yet dense with messages and illustrated with stunningly beautiful paintings-an absolute joy for readers to explore young or old. Thanks for sharing this with the world, Balint. It is needed. -Illustrator Brian Rea
BOOKSELLER REVIEWS
This gorgeous, wordless picture book features 184 pages of stunning hand-painted watercolor illustrations... The perfect addition to any collector's library! And not just your young readers' but for any art connoisseur! -Books of Wonder (New York, NY)
Though I adore the written word, there is a magic in the ability of a wordless picture book to take our imaginations to a place of connection and meaning of our own interpretation... A fantastical journey of discovery and transformation... The visual storytelling reminds us that everything in the world is connected and that together we can find our way. -Interabang Books (Dallas, TX)
We're just going to say it: Bunny & Tree is a masterpiece of children's storytelling... Tells the story of an unlikely friendship between a bunny and a tree through illustrations alone, enveloping the reader in a rich world of narrative imagery. We love it! -Oblong Books (Hudson Valley, NY)
We are enamored with this gorgeous all-ages storybook... Absolutely enchanting. -Spectator Books (Oakland, CA)
The Shelf Editions Pick for September! A wonderful wordless piece of art and an epic tale of friendship and adventure... This book is a wild ride of friendship and adventure, full of imagination and emotion. It's really a feast for the eyes and soul, one to pore over. -Shelf Editions (Lincoln, UK)
Oh, what a magnificent book! Bunny & Tree is a wordless book by Balint Zsako, with the most stunning atmospheric illustrations that are imbued with such sensitivity, and which tell the tale beauitfully! ... This sweet and tender story about friendship and adventure will warm the hearts of readers of all ages. -Tales for Tadpoles (Dublin, Ireland)
