The Alcuin Society has announced the winners of the 42nd annual Awards for Excellence in Book Design in Canada.

A total of 228 entries  by 112 Canadian designers were submitted by 81 Canadian publishers. The judging panel was composed of book designers Donna Braggins, Bryan Gee, and Shelley Gruendler.

The winning titles are:

Children’s Picture Books / Livres illustrés pour enfants

• First: Mushrooms Know: Wisdom From Our Friends the Fungi (Greystone Kids), Sara Gillingham (designer)
• Second: Mad at Dad (Kids Can Press), Barb Kelly (designer)
• Third: A Face Is a Poem (Tundra Books/Penguin Random House Canada), John Martz (designer)
• Honourable Mention: Boozhoo! / Hello! (Groundwood Books), Michael Solomon (designer)
• Honourable Mention: Towed by Toad (Tundra Books/PRHC), Sophie Paas-Lang (designer)
• Honourable Mention: Bog Myrtle (Annick Press), Rachel Nam (designer)

Comics / Graphic Novels / Bande dessinées

• First: The Gulf (Tundra Books/PRHC), John Martz (designer)
• Second: Raw Sewage Science Fiction (Drawn & Quarterly), Marc Bell (designer)
• Third: Vera Bushwack (Drawn & Quarterly), Sig Burwash (designer)
• Honourable Mention: The Cosmic Con (At Bay Press), Lucas C. Pauls, Matt Joudrey (designers)
• Honourable Mention: The Forgotten Frontier (At Bay Press), Lucas C. Pauls, Matt Joudrey (designers)

Limited editions / Éditions à tirage limité

• First: Treasure Island (Conversation Tree Press), Anthony Geer (designer)
• Second: The Turn | Like a Moth at a Window (Greenboathouse Press), Jason Dewinetz (designer)

Poetry / Poésie

• First: The Undesirables: a bestiary (Emily Carr University Press), Courtenay Webber / The Future (designer)
• Second: cipher (Beautiful Outlaw Press), Mark Goldstein (designer)
• Third: Sorry About the Fire (Biblioasis), Natalie Olsen (designer)

Prose: fiction / Romans et nouvelles

• First: Dayspring (Strange Light/Penguin Random House Canada), Jennifer Griffiths (designer)
• Second: Batshit Seven (Penguin Canada), Mathew Flute (designer)
• Third: Every Night I Dream I’m a Monk, Every Night I Dream I’m a Monster (Freehand Books), Natalie Olsen (designer)
• Honourable Mention: How it Works Out (Anchor Canada/Penguin Random House Canada), Jennifer Griffiths (designer)
• Honourable Mention: Prairie Edge (Strange Light/PRHC), Kate Sinclair (designer)

Prose: illustrated / Prose illustrée

• First: Taizo Yamamoto: Carts, Hedges, Lions (Figure 1 Publishing), Jessica Sullivan (designer)
• Second: La chasse interdite (Éditions du Noroît), Maxime Rheault (Criterium) (designer)
• Third: He Hijacked My Brain: Gary Topp’s Toronto (UXB Press Canada), Noël Nanton; Nadia Molinari (typotherapy), (designers)
• Honourable Mention: Giant Robot: 30 Years of Defining Asian American Pop Culture (Drawn & Quarterly), Megan Tan, Tracy Hurren (designers)

Prose: non-fiction / Études et essais

• First (tie): Les forces du sommeil – cohabitations des vivants: Manif d’art 11: la biennale de Québec (Manif d’art), Maxime Rheault, Marie-Joëlle Lemire, Chany Lagueux (Criterium) (designers)
• First (tie): A Nation’s Paper: The Globe and Mail in the Life of Canada (Signal/Penguin Random House Canada), Kate Sinclair (designer)
• Third: What I Mean to Say: Remaking Conversation in Our Time (House of Anansi Press), Greg Tabor / Series Design: Bill Douglas and Ingrid Paulson / / Text Design (designers)
• Honourable Mention: Five Manifestos for the Beautiful World (Alchemy by Knopf Canada/Penguin Random House Canada), Jennifer Griffiths (designer)

Reference / Ouvrages de référence

• First: Hemingway s’est paqueté la fraise et autre cocktails originaux (Québec Amerique), Christian Salette (designer)
• Second: The Side Gardener: Recipes & Notes from My Garden (Appetite by Random House), Kelly Hill (designer)
• Third: San Diego Cooks: Recipes from the Region’s Favorite Eateries, Bakeries, and Bars (Figure 1 Publishing), Naomi MacDougall, Jessica Sullivan (designers)

Pictorial Including Exhibition catalogues / Beaux livres, y compris catalogues d’exposition

• First: (tie) Gathered Leaves: Discoveries from the Drawings Vault / Feuille à feuille: La collection de dessins dévoillée, [Two distinct volumes comprising the English edition and the French edition], (National Gallery of Canada), François Martin (designer)
• First: (tie) AP205 Amancio Williams: Readings of the Archive by Studio Muoto, Claudia Schmidt, and Pezo von Ellrichshausen (Canadian Centre for Architecture), Matthias Kreutzer / Our Polite Society (designer)
• Third: Women on the Move: An Exhibition of Travel Books (Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto), David Moratto (designer)
• Honourable Mention: Clara Gutsche: Portraits d’enfants. Children (Optica, centre d’art contemporain), Dominique Mousseau (designer)
• Honourable Mention: Helen McNicoll: un voyage impressionniste / An Impressionist Journey (Musée national des beaux-arts de Québec / MNBAQ), Marc André Roy (designer)
• Honourable Mention: Canadian Photographs: Geoffrey James (Figure 1 Publishing), Naomi MacDougall /DSGN Dept. (designer)

The books will be exhibited across Canada at Simon Fraser University, University of Victoria, University of Alberta, Arts & Letters Club of Toronto, Toronto Metropolitan University, National Gallery of Canada, Arts in Muskoka, McGill University, Université de Québec à Montréal, and NSCAD University. They will also be sent to Germany where they will be exhibited at the Frankfurt Bookfair and the Leipzig Bookfair and entered in the Siftung Buchkunst’s international book design competition.

The Alcuin Society is a Canadian nonprofit that promotes the best in Canadian book design. The Alcuin Society’s Awards For Excellence in Book Design were established in 1981.

Correction, April 14: This post has been updated to correct Jessica Sullivan’s last name.