Zoom (Viking Kestrel picture books) [Hardcover]

Istvan Banyai (Author)

Book Description

Release date: March 1, 1995 | Age Range: 3 and up | Series: Viking Kestrel picture books

Open this wordless book and zoom from a farm to a ship to a city street to a desert island. But if you think you know where you are, guess again. For nothing is ever as it seems in Istvan Banyai

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This provocative wordless volume can be "read" either from front to back or even from back to front. Either way, it's a startling experience. Its illustrations "zoom" out, as though a viewer has rapidly backed away from each. For example, the first painting, of a jagged-edged red shape, turns out to be a detail of a rooster's comb; as the pages turn, the bird diminishes in importance, until the barn where he stands is shown to be a toy on a magazine's cover. That magazine dangles from the hand of a dozing boy, who himself becomes but a smudge on an advertising billboard. These shifts in perspective repeat until the book abandons earth altogether. The last image is a tiny white sphere-our planet-against a night sky. The bold color and level of detail in Banyai's cartoons recall "Prince Valiant" or another of the "realistic" Sunday comics. If the concept is not wholly new, the execution is superior. Readers are in for a perpetually surprising-and even philosophical-adventure. All ages.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal

PreSchool-Grade 3?This wordless picture book re-creates the effect of a camera lens zooming out. For example, one illustration shows a boy on a cruise ship, the next shows him from a distance, and the next reveals the whole ship. Finally, the viewpoint moves back farther and it turns out that the ship is actually a poster on a bus. The perspective continues to recede, revealing the bus as an image on a television screen. Three pages later, viewers see that the person watching TV is drawn on a postage stamp. The final picture shows a view of Earth from space. To heighten the effect, all of the full-color illustrations appear on the recto, while each verso is completely black. It's fun to watch the transition in perceptions as a farm becomes a toy, the girl playing with it is on a magazine cover, etc. The novelty soon wears off, however, and nothing else about the book is memorable. The paintings themselves are not particularly interesting and would not stand alone well. David Wiesner's Free Fall (Lothrop, 1988), David Macaulay's Black and White (Houghton, 1990), and Ann Jonas's Reflections (Greenwillow, 1987) use visual tricks, but also have richer artwork and more involving action.?Steven Engelfried, West Linn Library, OR
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Age Range: 3 and up
  
• Hardcover: 64 pages
• Publisher: Viking Juvenile; First edition (March 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670858048
• ISBN-13: 978-0670858040
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 0.4 x 9.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (66 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #68,632 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #19 in Books > Children's Books > Arts, Crafts & Music > Art > Painting

More About the Author

Istvan Banyai, creator of the award-winning children's book Zoom and The Other Side, has produced illustrations for such publications as the New Yorker, Playboy, and Rolling Stone; cover art for Sony and Verve Records; and animated short films for Nickelodeon and MTV Europe. He lives in Connecticut.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

51 of 53 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Zee title, she do not lie February 8, 2006

By E. R. Bird HALL OF FAMETOP 500 REVIEWER

Format:Paperback

Though he's illustrated books for other authors before this, it was really with "Zoom" that artist Istvan Banyai first tried his hand at the wide world of children's picture books. Do a quick Google search of Banyai and you'll see that the man has dipped his toe in everything from book illustrations to pictures for Playboy. Now as a children's librarian I am always on the lookout for good wordless picture books. The wordlessier they are the better. My favorites up until now have been titles like "The Boy, the Bear, the Baron, and the Bard" by Gregory Rogers and "Anno's Journey" by Mr. Mitsumasa Anno himself. In light of his more recent efforts ("The Other Side" comes to mind) it's funny to see how simple his books were at the start. "Zoom" is not a particularly new idea for a book, but it is a fun concept and is sure to garner itself some solid fans throughout the years.

The very first thing you see, on opening the book, is a fleshy and pointed starfish-like creature, but with too many points. Turn the page and the next image is of that same pointy image, but we can see that it's actually the crest of a rooster's comb. Turn the page again and we back up even farther still. Now the rooster is seen perched on a fence while two captivated youngsters look on. You get the gist of the book. The thing is, Banayi keeps backing up, even when you think that there would be nowhere else to go. A farm scene suddenly becomes a toy farm set with a child playing with it. A city street becomes a television program. And a cruise ship resolves itself to be an ad on the side of a bus. As the book backs off farther and farther and farther, in the end the earth recedes until it is only a single white dot in the center of a very black page. Want your kids to grasp the concept of their own inherent insignificance in the face of a vast unyielding universe? Then "Zoom"'s the book for you!

It took me a little while to realize it, but the book that bears the closest resemblance to "Zoom" is Barbara Lehman's Caldecott Honor winner, "The Red Book". Of course, the advantage of "The Red Book" is that it actually had a plot of sorts. "Zoom", for all its charms, is plotless. In some ways, the best wordless picture books are the ones that dare to tell some kind of a tale. "Home" by Jeannie Baker, for example, told the story of a girl's life from birth to adulthood and how the world changes around her. As Banyai becomes more comfortable with creating children's books he begins to understand their purpose. Therefore "The Other Side" has an ending that summarizes nicely whereas "Zoom" simply drifts off into space.

Which isn't to say that the book is poorly done. It ain't. Using his customary thin thin black pen lines and a palette of all sorts of colors, Banyai brings to life everything from the hypnotic eye of a rooster to New York's Flatiron Building. Unfortunately for me, the version of "Zoom" that I am reviewing is the paperback edition. This is a real shame as I've been delighted by Banyai's small touches and flourishes made to his books' covers and bookflaps. If it comes down to purchasing the hardcover edition of this story or the paperback, I highly urge you to consider the hardcover. Though I can't vouch for whether or not there are any fun details attached to it, why take the chance? Besides, when it comes to viewing Banyai's books with true appreciation, only hardcover will possibly do.

As with most high-concept picture book, "Zoom" isn't aiming to be universally beloved. It will instead be enjoyed primarily by those children of the correct mindset. Some kids will get a huge kick out of the perpetually shifting realities captured in this minute little booklet. Others will be weirded out by the concept and clutch their "Dora the Explorer" paperbacks a little tighter to their chests. I sincerely hope your child is in the former category. "Zoom" certainly deserves to be looked at and makes a fine addition to anyone's wordless picture book collection.

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars The Bigger Picture August 27, 2006

By Miri

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

The friend who shared this book with me had received it from a family member who bequeathed it to her as she lay dying of cancer. It is a very beautiful and visual way of internalizing the concept that our lives and everything that happens to us and that we see around us is part of a bigger picture.

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Getting the BIG picture March 18, 2006

By Harry J. Mcdargh

Format:Paperback

I ran into a description of this remarkable book that is entirely of images in a Sharon Salzburg's "Faith" Learning to Trust YOur Inner Experience". Salzburg, a well regarded Buddhist teacher, used Zoom to make that point that at every point of our existence our vision of what is real is always a tiny piece of what really is.. This deceptively simple book is meant to be looked at slowly and contemplatively. Each frame yields to a progressively bigger and bigger view so that the net effect of moving through its expanding perspective is to loosen our imaginations about what we think is the ultimate environment. Worth spending time with at ANY age.