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This November, the Spanish-language licensed edition of El Increíble Libro, published under the arrangement of B. K. Agency, was showcased at the world’s second-largest book fair: Guadalajara International Book Fair, Mexico.

 

To exhibit the book, its local publisher, Ediciones Castillo (a subsidiary of Macmillan Education Mexico), created a huge message wall and encouraged visitors to write remarks alongside ideas and images taken from the pages of The Incredible Book. Castillo’s stand, which played with the book’s premise in a layered and utterly charming way, won the fair’s Gold Award for Best Booth Design after having captured the imagination of all passersby.

 

How amazing are books? What purpose do they serve? Where can they take us? In The Incredible Book, ostriches, penguins, mice, crocodiles, and giraffes each give different answers to these questions; readers, however, are free to form their own responses, just as kids (and grown-ups) were able to express their wonderful originality on Ediciones Castillo’s wall.

 

The Incredible Book is a wordless picture book written by renowned author-illustrator Sifan Yang. It began collecting international awards soon after its 2016 publication—Germany’s White Ravens Award and the Japan Illustrators’ Association Illustration Award among them—and placed in the top ten of that year’s Annual Chinese Picture Book List. Although it contains no text, readers have countless ways to interact with the work, which, through its bright illustrations and creative stories, leaves unlimited room for invention.

 

As one of this planet’s most widely used languages, Spanish is spoken natively by over 500 million people worldwide. And the Guadalajara Book Fair—among the preeminent cultural festivals in Latin America and an important platform for copyright export—is an invaluable gateway into this enormous and under-tapped market.

 

The Incredible Book’s rights were managed by Ulises Benítez, Rights Director of the Taiwan Pavilion at Guadalajara Book Fair and International Sales Specialist at B. K. Agency. Ulises worked at Penguin Random House Mexico for seven years as an editor in its trade and literary department, and his extensive experience has helped sell many Chinese-language works into Latin America, including Bei Lynn’s Practicing Goodbye, Higo Wu’s Still Young, Still New, and Liu Hsu Kung’s The Orange Horse.

In recent years, B. K. Agency has been increasingly focused on exporting rights for children’s books from China and Taiwan; besides the above-mentioned deals, we have sold rights into Spain, the USA, South Korea, Indonesia, and Ukraine. Additionally, in 2022, we helped Caves Books export more than 45,000 English-language learning books to Egypt, thereby laying the groundwork for the future presence of Taiwan ELT products in that market.

 

Of course, we shall continue to promote our many wonderful publications, showcasing their richness and diversity to all overseas markets and expanding the international presence of our local authors and artists.