Zoom

I ran into a description of this remarkable book that is entirely of images in a Sharon Salzburg's "Faith" Learning to Trust YOur Inner Experience". Salzburg, a well regarded Buddhist teacher, used Zoom to make that point that at every point of our existence our vision of what is real is always a tiny piece of what really is.. This deceptively simple book is meant to be looked at slowly and contemplatively. Each frame yields to a progressively bigger and bigger view so that the net effect of moving through its expanding perspective is to loosen our imaginations about what we think is the ultimate environment. Worth spending time with at ANY age.

I learned about this book a few years ago in a teambuilding workshop and finally decided to get a copy for myself. It still blows my mind. A great aide for getting people to "think outside the box". For teambuilding, I plan to remove each page and have them all laminated. then, pass them out to a group, each person getting one page. They may not show their page to anyone, but must talk to others in the group to figure out what all the pages have in common. It gets groups started talking and everyone ends up having to interact with everyone else!

I was introduced to this book last night when it was given as a gift to my 50 year-old cousin. All of the aduts present were intrigued with this near-wordless masterpiece. None of us read the inside jacket before 'reading' the book and that is the way it should be read to be truly appreciated. I think the book would be 'wasted' on very young children who would see it as just another picture book. Excellent gift. I'm ordering them for all my (grown) children this minute!

Although I am a professional writer, my review isn't nearly as technical as the previous two readers'. This, quite simply, is a FUN BOOK! My four month old daughter enjoys the bright images on each page and adults love the zoom concept! It keeps you guessing and reminds you to look at the bigger picture in life... perhaps reminding you that you're not in the world all on your own. Add this to your bookshelf and then pick up an extra copy as sometimes it is not easy to find and you'll surely want to give one as a gift!

I must disagree with the statement that this book is for children ages 6-8 since much of what Banyai does is well beyond what most children will understand. Banyai's virtual elimination of a fixed frame of reference pulls at the mind in a way that few books aimed at adults do--one simply never is quite sure what is going on. Not only is everything part of something larger (until the end when the earth becomes a period or a hole in the darkness), but there are a few subtle plays on the element of static versus moving and time versus non-time which invite considerable thought.This book plays on certain postmodern ideas and can be thought of as a very complex exploration of perception and semiosis. These topics are far from typical in "children's literature" and this book will provoke more thought than most popular serious novels will.Really quite an excellent book!