Winner of the Bologna Ragazzi Award 2016, New Horizon

As the jury of Bologna Children's Book Fair said: "The inventive modular composition of this vibrant book combines a repeated series of simple geometrical shapes in primary colours. No exercise in abstract painting, it is an original attempt to give visual form to tongue twisters and the difficulty of pronouncing certain words very fast. Cleverly crafted juxtaposition of the images hides the words, which if pronounced wrongly, lead to an amusing jumble of the patterns."

The illustrations of the book represent visually the confusion that happens when tongue twisters are read out loud. Made from a burst of simple shaped and modular Arabic letters, these hand-made illustrations play on the meaning of each tongue twister and take readers into a visual world that’s as confusing and fun as the verbal one.

The illustrations hide the words of each tongue twister in a witty puzzle for readers to decipher.

Written by: Fatima Sharafeddine

Published by: Kalimat Publishing

Illustrated by: Hanane Kai

With the help of Adrea Choukeir in the hand coloring

To further reinforce the repeating aspect of tongue twisters, when multiple books are displayed side by side, the illustration on the covers continue seamlessly across books.

My aim was for the illustrations to be as puzzling and fun as the tongue twisters themselves. I wanted them to be a visual representation of the confusion that happens verbally when reading the tongue twisters. I imagined the letters tangled together, but I also didn’t want the illustration to be just an abstract composition.

I used the Arabic letters of each tongue twister is a modular way. I made each illustration hint to the meaning of each tongue twister without it being too literal or obvious. It's a puzzle, and needs to require some effort to figure out. For example, if a tongue twister is about carrots, you'd see a rabbit instead.