Aroma de galletas (The Smell of Cookies)

This book compiles texts by Antonio Fernández Molina that have already been published in volumes with titles as loud as Platos de Amargo Alpiste (Dishes of Bitter Alpist) or Sonetos Crudos (Raw Sonnets). This one is called The Smell of Cookies because one of the illustrations features, on a double-page spread, a little girl riding on the back of a giant cockroach: we had to give it a harmless title so that grandmas would not be frightened and could gift this book to their grandchildren.

For the rest, it includes free and even liberated verses, sonnets with the feel of other times, and short stories, of only a few lines, that speak of the wonderful world hidden behind the ugly and the ordinary, of that elephant waiting for us on the other side of the door -we can see it through the peephole- that will not let us leave the house. Antonio Fernández Molina, writer and painter of abundant, but unknown work, had not published to date anything in children’s collections, but his six daughters and his grandchildren have read all of his work and have been raised in good health and with good humour. What more can be said?

Isol, the illustrator of these stories and poems, resides in Buenos Aires, a city rich in aromas where the vulgar and the most unusual merge. Isol’s drawings seem to have escaped from those old biscuit boxes where over time treasures have been hoarded: collectible cards, precious stones, wires, screws, and other amulets.