March has been a really huge and exciting month.
We announced our Notable Australian Graphic Novels of 2022 short list. These are, we believe, the best graphic novels by Australian creators published last year and we believe every library should have them. You can find the short list and long lists for 2022, 2021, and 2020 on our notables page here.
There have been lots of other exciting announcements too. Lee Lai’s Stone Fruit is one of the recipients of the ALA’s Stonewall Honor Books in Literature, you can find the list here. The CBCA Short List for Older Readers includes not one but two graphic novels: Neverlanders by Tom Taylor and Jon Sommariva and The Greatest Thing by Sarah Winifred Searle. You can find the list here. And Eloise Grills’ Big Beautiful Female Theory, a hybrid work of poetry, essay and comics, is in the Stella Prize short list. You can find the list here. Congratulations to all of them, we’re elated that comics and graphic novels are increasingly being recognised in book and literary awards and internationally.
As the year progresses, there have been plenty of announcements for upcoming new graphic novels and we’re very excited for everything that’s been announced on the horizon. Remy Lai will be publishing Ghost Book with Allen & Unwin. C.S. Pacat and Johanna the Mad will be publishing a Fence: Redemption, through Boom! Studios, Brenton McKenna will be publishing Hairy Holes through Magabala Books, Stuart McMillen will be publishing The Town Without Television with Scribe and Eleri Harris will be publishing Drawn From the Margins, co-written with S. Mirk and published by Abrams Comic Arts. We look forward to all these books and so many others coming up in the next few months.
Let’s see what April has in store for us.
In the meantime, here are some news, podcasts, and exciting new titles, including three junior graphic novels by Australian creators Renee Treml, Brenton McKenna, James Foley and Stephen Kok.
News
The Comic Arts Awards of Australia have published a freely available PDF of the 2022 Comic Arts Awards of Australia Annual with 96 pages with all the shortlisted titles and creators plus really interesting essays and contributions. The PDF is available here.
Lee Lai’s Stone Fruit is one of the recipients of the Stonewall Honor Books in Literature for 2022. The Stonewall Awards are the first and most enduring awards by the American Library Association for LGBTQIA+ books. We’re thrilled to hear the news. If you want to revisit our creator chat with Lee Lai, you can listen to it here or find Episode 29 of our podcast wherever you listen to podcasts.
Francis Ford Coppola is working on comics with Chris Ryall and Jacob Phillips to be published by Image Comics. Popverse covered the announcement and you can read all about it here.
The Beat reports that Abrams Comics will be publishing an exciting anthology of short stories with Marvel super heroes with an outstanding roster of creators that includes: Jerry Craft, Gale Galligan and Ben Hatke, among others. Marvel Super Stories will be out October 2023. For more info visit The Beat here.
There’s no doubt that Shonen Jump is one of the best apps for reading Manga. Kodansha has now announced their own app. Details are still a bit sketchy and it seems like it won’t be launching in Australia yet, but the app will launch in May. ICv2 has the lowdown.
The trend of webcomics being picked up by traditional print publishers continues. Dark Horse has signed a deal with Tapas to publish comics from their platform in print. All the details and the first four titles being published are on The Beat here.
Collections
Last year we were honoured to have Jillian Rudes presenting in our webinar and her book is finally out. Manga in Libraries: A Guide for Teen Librarians by Jillian Rudes, published by ALA Editions is available here or your trusty local bookshop could probably order it for you.
Sara Smith is a very active and generous librarian. She’s a regular speaker and she always shares her presentations. Her latest presentation is Supersize Your Graphic Novel Collection and we highly recommend it.
The School Library Journal has published A Starter Manga Set: 15 Titles for Children and Tweens.
Operation Comic Book is a non-profit that aims to educate on the inherent literary and literacy value of comics. They’ve published Captain Comic Book: Reading is Power, a free comic book which could be a good resource in the classroom.
Podcasts
James Foley has just published a new graphic novel, Secret Agent Mole, and he was a guest on the Words and Nerds podcast. You can listen to the podcast episode here.
The Readings Podcast has published a really interesting conversation with documentary filmmaker Charlie Hill-Smith who’s been working on a new comic book Crime Scene Australia. Part 1 of the comic has now been published in print and on Amazon. The plan is to publish it in parts first and then compile it in a hardcover graphic novel. The comic is a historical and satirical look at the frontier wars in Australia. Collaborators include: Carroll Karpany, Robbie Thorpe, Michael Kumnick, Juan Serrano and Bruce Pascoe. You can find the podcast episode here on Soundcloud and here on iTunes. You can buy Crime Scene Australia Part 1, Terror Nullius on Kindle now.
The Off Panel Podcast published a really interesting episode recently worth a listen that you can find here. The episode is a long discussion with Manga journalist Deb Aoki.
NEW RELEASE TITLES
Junior
Bruce Wayne: Not Super by Stuart Gibbs, Berat Pekmezci (DC Comics)
Call the Name of the Night by Tama Mitsuboshi (Yen)
Eccentric Doctor of the Moon Flower Kingdom by Tohru Himuka (Seven Seas)
Hairy Holes by Brenton McKenna (Magabala Books) [Australian creator]
Hilo 9: Gina and the Last City on Earth by Judd Winnick (Random House)
A History of Japan in Manga: Samurai, Shoguns, and World War II by Kanaya Shunichiro (Tuttle)
The Librarian of Auschwitz: The Graphic Novel by Antonio Iturbe, Salva Rubio, Loreto Aroca (Henry Holt & Company)
The Moth Keeper by K. O’Neill (Random House)
Ollie and Bea: Bunny Ideas by Renee Treml (Allen & Unwin) [Australian creator]
Ollie and Bea: Otter-ly Ridiculous by Renee Treml (Allen & Unwin) [Australian creator]
Pandora Perfect by Roger Langridge, Brett Parson (Rebellion)
Secret Agent Mole Book 1: Golfishfinger by James Foley (Scholastic) [Australian creator]
Shazam! Thundercrack by Yehudi Mercado (DC Comics)
Skull Cat and the Curious Castle by Norman Shurtliff (TopShelf)
Stick and Stone on the Go by Beth Ferry, Kristen Cella (Clarion Books)
Squished by Megan Wagner Lloyd, Michelle Mee Nutter (Scholastic)
Word Smith Vol 4: Trust by Stephen Kok, P.R. Dedelis (TL Creative) [Australian creator]
YA
Bomb by Steve Sheinkin, Nick Bertozzi (Roaring Brook Press)
Frida Kahlo: Her Life, Her Work, Her Home by Francisco de la Mora (SelfMadeHero)
Hidden Systems: Water, Electricity, the Internet and the Secrets Behind the Systems We Use Every Day by Dan Nott (Random House)
In Limbo by Deb JJ Lee (First Second)
Project Nought by Chelsey Furedi (Clarion Books)
Teen Titans: Robin by Kami Garcia, Gabriel Picolo (DC Comics)
Adult
Ashes by Alvaro Ortiz (IDW)
Carmilla: The First Vampire by Amy Chu, Soo Lee (Dark Horse Comics)
The Children of Bathala: A Mythology Class Reunion by Arnold Arre (Tuttle Publishing)
Ephemera: A Memoir by Briana Loewinsohn (Fantagraphics)
The Extraordinary Part: Book 1 Orsay’s Hands by Florent Ruppert, Jerome Mulot (Fantagraphics)
The Heavy Bright by Cathy Malkasian (Fantagraphics)
The Nice House on the Lake Vol 2 by James Tynion IV, Alvaro Martinez Bueno, Jordie Bellaire (DC Comics)
Starman: David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust Years by Reinhard Kleist (SelfMadeHero)
Tombs: Junji Ito Story Collection by Junji Ito (Viz)
The Villainess and the Demon Knight by Nekoda and Seikan (Steamship)
