SPECIAL MENTION
噔噔噔 (Thump! Thump! Thump!)
Text by Yu Yi
Illustrations by Wang Zumin
21st Century Publishing Group, China, 2022
What the jury said:
This is a strange and humorous book with strong cover art and painterly illustrations. Told through a host of colourful animals bursting with character and personality and a good sense of absurd, Thump! Thump! Thump! (knock knock knock) is a book about neighborliness, friendship, preconceptions and communication, with a mischievous plot twist. It has a simple storyline based on the structure of the traditional children’s game where a message is whispered from one to another until it has been shared to everyone in the group. While the page layout is classical, the style of the illustration evokes the Art Brut movement. The artist makes good use of space and colour on each page, creating strong individual portraits, and everyone gets the opportunity to be the hero of the story, starting from the lady hens, the new neighbor.