Published by: Spanish Comunicarte Editorial / China Anhui Children’s Publishing House / Italy Gallucci Editore

A woman leaves her home and travels the world in search of the ideal man, while he is sitting under a lilac tree in a square near her house, waiting for her…

A story about love and the need to cross the world to find it. The search for the beloved, the sweetheart’s awaiting and the parable of the journey we undertake to find what we want, ignoring that it might as well be at our point of departure, are at the core of this story which subverts the rules of traditional story telling by having the lady going in search of love whilst the man remains awaiting.

María Teresa Andruetto, in my view the most accomplished writer of today’s Latin American Children’s and Youth Literature, presents a love story in three stages, with her marked personal imprint and a poetic, condensed language, and a round end. Luis Bernardo Yepes Osorio, RELALIJ Magazine

El árbol de lilas (The Lilac Tree) is a good book to put librarians and teachers into trouble. Which shelf should I put it in? Is it a short story, is it poetry? Words are distributed in verse, actions and dialogues repeat with slight variations in the way of refrains. A form closer to play, to popular poetry than to conventional prose; however, there’s a story being told, a love story. Marcela Carranza, Imaginaria Magazine

Prizes and honours awarded

The Best Books for Children and Young People. Banco del Libro de Venezuela, 2008

Mention by Comité de Selección de Fundalectura. Bogotá, 2007

Selected by Bratislava Biennial of Illustration 2007. Illustrations by Liliana Menéndez

Honor List. IBBY 2007. International Board on Books for Young People

Distinguished by ALIJA, 2006

Accésit Award 2006, Best Books Edited and Published in Argentina, by Cámara Argentina de Publicaciones (Argentine Publishing Chamber)