It’s a graphic novel! It’s an art book! It’s an action-packed fantasy adventure from French visionary Blexbolex, for readers young and old. "An exploration of the magic and difficulty of childhood, the wonders of the imagination, and the unique properties of books themselves, The Magicians is another utterly surprising gift from the singular mind of Blexbolex. You’ll want to read it again and again.” —Brian Selznick, author & illustrator of The Invention of Hugo Cabret and Big Tree In the corner of a quiet, long-abandoned house, something is bubbling up and protesting. Suddenly, out from their hiding spots burst three young shapeshifting magicians—an elephant, a blackbird, and a human girl—each of whom embarks on their own journey. But a fierce young Huntress and a mechanical lion-dragon named Clinker are hot on their trails... and won't rest until every last magician is vanquished. Fans of Japanese filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki's work or The Wizard of Oz will feel right at home in the pages of The Magicians , with its fabulously eclectic characters and entertaining, suspenseful, dreamlike story inspired by video games, science fiction, fantasy, and fairy tales. Magic is the beating heart of this multi-world universe—the magic of nature, the magic of childhood, the magic of creativity and imagination. Here, Blexbolex celebrates the mysterious, beautiful mess of life. Every gorgeous page features a silkscreen-style illustration that brilliantly layers three Pantone spot colors, in a festive palette that suggests “vintage circus.” From the heavy cardstock binding with French flaps, to the bronze metallic endpapers, to the book's paper evoking that of classic comic books, Blexbolex carefully selected the materials that would best realize his vision. The result? A visually stunning work of art. Blexbolex is an award-winning French graphic artist living in Berlin. Enchanted Lion Books has previously published English translations of four of his picture books, including People , Vacation , and two New York Times Best Illustrated selections: Seasons and Ballad. A Wall Street Journal Best Children's Book of 2023 • A Kirkus Best Book of 2023 • A Booklist Editors' Choice • Selected for the Wall Street Journal Holiday Books Gift Guide, Publishers Weekly’s Holiday Gift Guide, and A Room of One’s Own's Holiday Catalog • A Moonbow Best Children’s Book of 2023 • A 100 Scope Notes Most Astonishingly Unconventional Children’s Book of 2023 • A Publishers Weekly Big Indie Book of the Fall NOTE: Folding pages are part of the design. A Wall Street Journal Best Book of 2023 - Selected for the Wall Street Journal Holiday Gift Books Guide - A Kirkus Best Middle Grade Book of 2023 - A Booklist Editors' Choice: Graphic Novels, 2023 - A Moonbow Best Children’s Book of 2023 - A 100 Scope Notes Most Astonishingly Unconventional Children’s Book of 2023 - Selected for Publishers Weekly 's Big Indie Books of Fall feature AND PW’s Holiday Gift Guide! - Selected for A Room of One’s Own’s 2023 Holiday Catalog - A Daily Bulldog Holiday Book Pick for 2023 - Shelf Editions Bookshop Book of the Month, January 2024 - Featured in We Are Teachers ’s “Best New Books Coming November 2023 for Kids and Teachers” - STARRED reviews from Kirkus , Booklist , and Publishers Weekly “Blexbolex is a singular talent, someone whose work, while often referencing the past, is entirely his own. In The Magicians , his beautiful and strange illustrations—built up digitally through his signature spot-color layers, inspired by traditional screen printing—are combined with a Japanese binding technique that is rarely ever seen in published books. The seemingly simple layout of almost the entire book (one drawing and a few lines of text per page, two per spread) belies a delightfully complicated story about three magicians being pursued by a huntress and her mechanical dragon. But who are the good guys here? Who are the villains? An exploration of the magic and difficulty of childhood, the wonders of the imagination, and the unique properties of books themselves, The Magicians is another utterly surprising gift from Blexbolex. You’ll want to read it again and again.” ― Brian Selznick , Author & illustrator of The Invention of Hugo Cabret and Big Tree “With an almost monastic commitment to creating images that feel both universal and deeply personal, Blexbolex has swerved in the course of his career from wild, aggressive mark-making to a pure distillation of forms. He has relentlessly followed a muse that has surely been an exhausting alchemical pursuit. The result is this generous story that trusts the reader’s youthful intuition that the solidity we perceive in the modern world is only one layer, and it’s tissue paper thin, like the brilliant, kinetic illustrations themselves. As with all great kids' stories, The Magicians is really about remembering the things we were born knowing and taught to forget. Blexbolex striv