The best Canadian comics of 2022

Here are the CBC Books picks for the top Canadian comicsof the year!

Squireby Sara Alfageeh &NadiaShammas

Squire,a fantasy graphic novel, follows a young woman namedAiza. She's a member of the Ornu people, a subjugatedgroup in the crumbling Bayt-Saiji Empire. With war on the horizon, Aiza enlists to train as a Squirein hopes it will lead her to Knighthood and full citizenship. But as Aiza navigates the social and physical rigours of military training, she realizes the Empire's plans for "the greater good" may not be what's best for her people.

Nadia Shammas is a Palestinian American writer basedin Toronto. Her previous work includesCORPUS: A Comic Anthology of Bodily AilmentsandMs. Marvel: Stretched Thin.

Sara Alfageeh is a Jordanian American illustrator from Boston. She's illustrated comics and picture books, including for Marvel Comics andStar Wars.

Ducksby Kate Beaton

Ducksis an autobiographical graphic novel that recounts author Kate Beaton'stime spent working in the Alberta oil sands. With the goal of paying off her student loans, Kate leaves her tight-knit seaside Nova Scotia community and heads west, where she encounters harsh realities, including the everyday trauma that no one discusses.

• Kate Beaton's affecting Ducks dives into the lonely life of labour in Alberta's oil sands

Kate Beaton is a cartoonist from Nova Scotia who launched her career by publishing the comic stripHark! A Vagrantonline. The sassy historical webcomic gained a following of 500,000 monthly visitors and was eventually turned into a bestselling book. Beaton's success continued with the bookStep Aside, Pops,which wonthe 2016 Eisner Award for best humour publication. Beatonhas also published two children's books,King BabyandThe Princess and the Pony.

LISTEN | Kate Beaton discusses Ducks with Shelagh Rogers:

The Next Chapter20:51Kate Beaton on Ducks

Kate Beaton talks to Shelagh Rogers about her graphic memoir, Ducks.

Raveby Jessica Campbell

This graphic novel follows a 15-year-old girl named Lauren, who is a faithful member of an evangelical church. After herdevout parents banish evolution textbooks fromthe house, Lauren goes to studyand sleeps over at her classmate Mariah'shouse. The evening develops into something Lauren never expected, and she's left to sort out a lifetime's worth of internalized homophobia and Christian guilt.

• Jessica Campbell explores a constrained girlhood in religion in her graphic novelRave

Jessica Campbell is an artist, originally from Victoria, whose work has been exhibited across the U.S. and Canada. Her previous books includeHot or Not: 20th Century Male ArtistsandXTC69.

LISTEN | Jessica Campbell discusses Rave on Q:

Shifting Earthby Cecil Castellucci, Flavia Biondi & Fabiana Mascolo

InShifting Earth, botanist Dr. Maeve Lindholm finds herself stranded on a strange parallel Earth after a freak particle storm,with little hope of getting home. Her home world is on the brink of ecological disaster, but in this parallel universe nature overshadowsscience, children are rare and humans pay an unthinkable price when they have been deemed useless.

• Imagining a parallel planet with 2 moons can give new perspectives on climate change, says author

Cecil Castellucciis an award-winning American-born Canadian YAnovelist, musician and director. Her other books includeShade, Odd DuckandStar Wars Moving Target. She has also written Batgirl for DC Comics.

Flavia Biondiis an Italian artist and scriptwriter. Her other works includeLa generazione(Generations) andLa giustamezura(Just Enough).

FabianaMascolois a comic book artist based in Rome.

LISTEN | WhyCecil Castellucci tackles climate change action in a comic:

Day 610:22Canadian graphic novelist hopes new novel will be a path toward climate action

Cecil Castellucci is a bestselling YA author who splits her time between Montreal and Los Angeles. Her latest graphic novel takes on a timely challenge climate change. Shifting Earth is about a botanist in the near future, collecting seeds from a climate-ravaged earth. She then lands in a parallel universe that is green and has everything they need, but there are still difficult choices to be made. Cecil Castelucci discusses writing about hope and inspiring a path toward climate action.

Genevive Castre: Complete Works 1981-2016

Genevive Castre: Complete Works 1981-2016is a posthumous collection ofthe works of illustrator, cartoonist and musicianGenevive Castre. Featuring an introduction fromCastre's widower, American musician Phil Elverum, the book collects never-before-seen illustrations, comics, album covers and more.

• How music helped Phil Elverum grieve his wife's death

Castrewas a cartoonist, illustrator and musician from Quebec. Her books include the memoirSusceptibleand the children's bookA Bubble,which she drew as a final gift to her then two-year-old daughter.Castre died of pancreatic cancer on July 9, 2016.

LISTEN | WhyPhil Elverum put together a collection ofGenevive Castre's work:

28:03In a new book, Phil Elverum celebrates his late wife Genevive Castre as an artist

The musician Phil Elverum, also known as Mount Eerie, has written multiple songs about the grief of losing his spouse, Genevive Castre, to cancer. But there's more to Castre than the story of her death. In a new art book, Genevive Castre: Complete Works 1981-2016, Elverum presents a selection of his wife's work as an acclaimed Canadian cartoonist and visual artist someone who lived passionately in the pursuit of art. He joined Tom Power to talk about shifting the narrative from sorrow to celebration.

Birds of Maineby Michael DeForge

Birds of Maineis a graphic novel that imagines lifeafter the demise of humankind. In this surreal and post-apocalyptic reality,birds roam freely and have constructed a new and more equitableworldorder.But when a new human arrives to this world, life as the birds know it changes forever.

• Michael DeForge's passion for comics and interest in utopian societies shapes his graphic novels and comic art

Michael DeForge is a Toronto-based creator who has won awards for comics likeLeaving Richard's Valley, DressingandLose #1.Other acclaimed books includeStunt,Big Kids, Ant Colony,Sticks Angelica Folk HeroandHeaven No Hell.DeForge was afinalist for the 2021 Doug Wright Awards for Canadian comicsfor the 2020 graphic novelFamiliar Face.

Time Zone Jby Julie Doucet

InTime Zone J,Montreal artist Julie Doucetdraws from her old diary entries to chroniclea whirlwind love affair from her early 20s. After developing an intimate correspondence with a reader overseas not unheard of in the 1980s, when comic artists often mailed their work and communicated with readers through letters Doucet flies from Montreal to France to meet the soldier, who's on furlough for a few days.

• Celebrated Montreal underground comic book artist Julie Doucet reinvents herself with memoir Time Zone J

Julie Doucetbegan drawing and publishing mini comics in 1988, and was featured in the anthologyHeck! Comic Art of the Late 1980s.She started her groundbreakingstripDirty Plottein the 1990s, becoming an underground heroine and winning the Harvey Award for best new talent.Her comics part-dream, part-diary have been published serially as well as in collected formats. She famously quit the male-dominated comics industry in the late 1990s to focus on her other artwork.Time Zone Jis her first inked comic since that announcement.

LISTEN | Julie Doucet discusses Time Zone J on Q:

Shelterbeltsby Jonathan Dyck

Shelterbeltstells the story of a Mennonite communitybreaking open, as traditional beliefs and modern values collide.The schisms in the community reach a turning point when a non-denominational mega-church opens on the edge of the rural village.Shelterbeltsweaves together scenes from the community a pastor and his queer daughter contend with lost parish members, a librarian writesprescriptive notes in books for her patrons and young activists fight with a farmer over pipeline construction on his land.

Jonathan Dyck is a cartoonist from Winnipeg. He hasreceived several provincial prizes for his illustrations, including a silver medal at the 2021 Alberta Magazine Awards and the Manuela Dias Book Design and Illustration Award at the 2018 Manitoba Book Awards.

LISTEN |Jonathan Dyck on sharing his experience inManitoba's Mennonite community:

The Next Chapter20:07Richard Van Camp & Scott B. Henderson on A Blanket of Butterflies

Richard Van Camp & Scott B Henderson talk to Shelagh Rogers about their graphic novel, A Blanket of Butterflies.

A Blanket of Butterfliesby Richard Van Camp, Scott B. Henderson & Donovan Yaciuk

When a mysterious stranger named Shinobu appears in Fort Smith, N.W.T. to claim a samurai sword and suit of armour from the museum, a youngTlicho Dene boy named Sonnyis eager to help inA Blanket of Butterflies.The only problem is that the sword now belongs to a man knownas Benny the Bank, who won it in a poker game. Now Shinobu, with some help from Sonny, his grandmother and a visitor from the spirit world,must face off against Benny and his men and reclaim his family's honour in the process.

• Richard Van Camp and Scott B. Henderson's graphic novel A Blanket of Butterflies soars again, in full-colour

Richard Van Camp is a TlichoDene writer from Fort Smith, N.W.T. who has written over 20 books acrossmultiple genres. His other books includeAngel Wing Splash Pattern,Night MovesandWe Sang You Home.

Scott B. Henderson is an author and illustrator based in Winnipeg. His other books includeBreakdownandPemmican Wars.He was also a contributor to the graphic anthologyThis Place: 150 Years Retold,which is now aCBCBooks podcast.

Donovan Yaniuck is a comic book colourist from Winnipeg.

LISTEN |Richard Van Camp & Scott B Henderson talk to Shelagh Rogers aboutA Blanket of Butterflies:

Cole Pauls and his Indigenous punk comics

6 years ago

Duration 4:13

Tahltan comic artist Cole Pauls has been inspired by punk music, pizza and carrying the legacy of Southern Tutchone language through his comic art. Filmmaker: Camille Vernet

A Train in the Nightby Anne-Marie Saint-Cerny &Christian Quesnel, translated by W. Donald Wilson

A Train in the Nightis the graphic novel adaptation of the Anne-Marie Saint-Cerny's nonfiction bookMgantic. The booktellsthe story of the 2013 summer night when a runaway train full of oil caused a massive explosion in the Quebec town ofLac-Mgantic. The disaster claimed 47 lives and is one of the deadliest railway accidents in Canadian history.A Train in the Nightconnectsthe dots fromthe scene of the accident to the corporations, investorsand politicians that may have played a role in the tragedy.

Anne-Marie Saint-Cernyis a writer, activist and videographerbased in Quebec. Her bookMganticwas shortlisted for the2018 Governor General's Literary Awardfor nonfiction.

Christian Quesnelis an author andcomic, graphic novel and children's bookillustratorfrom Saint-Andre-Avellin, Que.

W. Donald Wilson is a translator from Waterloo, Ont.

Kwndrby Cole Pauls

Kwndrcollects ColePauls's work from comicfestivals, magazines and zine-making workshops. The comics cover topics like racism, family and identityand featuresYukon history and Southern Tutchone cultural practices and languagelessons.

• Cole Pauls wrote an action-packed comic to help preserve Indigenous language

Cole Pauls is a Tahltan comic artist. He created his first comic,Dakwkda Warriors,as a language-revival initiative. In 2017, it won Broken Pencil magazine's awards for bestcomic andbest zine of the year. In 2020, it wonbestwork in an Indigenous language from the Indigenous Voices Awards. He is also the author of the graphic novelPizza Punks.

WATCH | Cole Pauls shares his Indigenous punkcomics: