Griso, the Unique

A unicorn searches for others just like him in this vibrant and shapeshifting tale by Batchelder-Honor author and illustrator, Roger Mello

The last of his kind, Griso travels the world searching for unicorn companions. He asks beetles, chameleons, and buffalos if they’ve seen any mythical creatures like him, and all send him on his way saying, ＂Neither here nor at the edge of the world.＂ Griso gallops across plains, marshes, and mountains, he trots into the sunset and chats with fearsome narwals by the sea. On each spread, we see Griso rendered in a new artistic style, portrayed as a shadowy cave painting, a chivalrous medieval stead, or lost along a mind-bending surrealist horizon. Griso, the Unique introduces young readers to artistic movements spanning the 7th to 18th century, leaping across time and color with the flip of a page. In Daniel Hahn’s exquisite translation, Griso, the Unique opens the doors to a world of African painting, Tang Dynasty murals, medieval tapestries, and art hidden beneath Egyptian pyramids. A song of color, time, expression, and a fantastical search for belonging by Brazilian visionary, Roger Mello.

Roger Mello has illustrated over 100 titles - 22 of which he also wrote - and his unique style and adroit sense of color continues to push the boundaries of children’s book illustration. Rather than relying on written narrative to tell the story, Mello invites his young readers to fill the gaps with imagination. Mello has won numerous awards for writing and illustrating, including three of IBBY’s Luis Jardim Awards, the Best Children’s Book 2002 International Award, and the 2014 Hans Christian Andersen Award. In 2018, You Can’t Be Too Careful! was named a Batchelder Honor Book by the American Library Association. Charcoal Boys was published by Elsewhere Editions in 2019 and was named a USBBY 2020 Outstanding International Book. And in 2022, João by a Thread also received a Batchelder Honor.

Translator Daniel Hahn is the author of a number of works of nonfiction, including The Tower Menagerie. He is one of the editors of The Ultimate Book Guide, a series of reading guides for children and teenagers. His translation of The Book of Chameleons by José Eduardo Agualusa won the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 2007, his translation of Agualusa’s A General Theory of Oblivion was shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize in 2016. He has translated the work of Philippe Claudel, María Dueñas, José Saramago, Eduardo Halfon, and others. He has collaborated with Roger Mello on three transcendent picture books: You Can’t Be Too Careful!, Charcoal Boys, and João by a Thread.