The Top 30 Graphic Novels in Canada, courtesy of BookManager. The full list is available here. The list is compiled by BookManager based on sales through over 400 independent bookstores. Sales through comic shops and larger retailers like Chapters-Indigo are not reflected in this list. For balance, you might want to try the Amazon.ca and Chapters-Indigo lists. This list has two parts, the top 30 overall and (at the bottom) the top 30 by Canadian creators. See here for last week’s list (well, 2 weeks ago…).

Top 30 Comics and Graphic Novels in Canada

1. Watchmen, Moore/Gibbons (DC)
2. Fruits Basket 21, Takaya Natsuki (Tokyopop)
3. Naruto 32, Masashi Kishimoto (VIZ)
4. Home Sweat Home, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
5. Naruto 31, Masashi Kishimoto (VIZ)
6. Garfield Spills the Beans, Jim Davis (Random House)
7. Simpsons Treehouse Horror, Groening et al (HarperCollins)
8. Fullmetal Alchemist 17, Hiromu Arakawa (VIZ)
9. It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, Charles M Schulz (Perseus)
10. Bleach 24, Tite Kubo (VIZ)
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11. Skim, Mariko Tamaki/Jillian Tamaki (Groundwood)
12. Black Cat 17, Kentaro Yabuki (VIZ)
13. Death Note 1, Ohba/Obata (VIZ)
14. Che, Rodriguez/Buhle (Verso)
15. Asterix and the Falling Sky, Albert Uderzo (Orion)
16. Pokemon: Diamond and Pearl Adventure 2, Shigekatsu Ihara (VIZ)
17. 30 Years of Laughs & Lasagna, Jim Davis (Random House)
18. Vampire Knight 1, Matsuri Hino (VIZ)
19. The Joker (Hardcover), Azzarello/Bermejo (DC)
20. The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle, Butcher/Syaf (Random House)
—–
21. The Dark Tower: The Long Road Home, King et al (Marvel)
22. Louis Riel, Chester Brown (D+Q)
23. Complete Persepolis, Satrapi (Knopf)
24. Bionicle 3: City of Legends, Elliott/Farshtey (St. Martin’s Press)
25. Chibi Vampire 1, Yuna Kagesaki (Tokyopop)
26. Rosario+Vampire 1, Akihisa Ikeda (VIZ)
27. Vampire Knight 5, Matsuri Hino (VIZ)
28. Cartoons From The New Yorker: 2009 Day-to-Day Calendar (Andrews McMeel)
29. Naruto 30, Masashi Kishimoto (VIZ)
30. Marvel Chronicle, Tom DeFalco (DK)

The pattern that emerges from looking at these lists over a period of weeks is that certain books, especially manga series, continuously jostle with each other, sliding up and down the longer list on the strength of a new volume or a spate of purchases for the kiddies. This week, Skim benefits from the Governor General’s bump –moving from somewhere below 30 to #11.

In total, BookManager lists over 4000 graphic novels, trades, and strip collections. It is a wondrous, scary place, where everyone from Tite Kubo to Lynda Barry duke it out, and where one sale in one tiny bookstore can move a book from #999 to #200. This is also the place where you find books by Canadian creators and where our Canadian Top 30 comes from:

Sequential’s All-Canadian Top 30 from BookManager

1. Home Sweat Home, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
2. Skim, Mariko Tamaki/Jillian Tamaki (Groundwood)
3. Louis Riel, Chester Brown (D+Q)
4. The Burma Chronicles, Guy Delisle (D+Q)
5. Big Foot, Graham Roumieu (Plume)
6. Senior’s Discount, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
7. Scott Pilgrim 4, Bryan Lee O’Malley (Oni)
8. Dramacon Ultimate Edition, Svetlana Chmakova (Tokyopop)
9. Milk Teeth, Julie Morstad (D+Q)
10. It’s a Good Life, If You Don’t Weaken, Seth (D+Q)
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11. Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea, Guy Delisle (D+Q)
12. Essex County 1: Tales from the Farm, Jeff Lemire (Top Shelf)
13. Dramacon 3, Svetlana Chmakova (Tokyopop)
14. The Plain Janes, Cecil Castellucci et al, (DC/Minx)
15. Rex Libris: I, Librarian, James Turner (Slave Labor Graphics)
16. Middle Age Spread, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
17. Emiko Superstar, Mariko Tamako Steve Rolston (DC/Minx)
18. Dramacon 3, Svetlana Chmakova (Tokyopop)
19. Essex County 2: Ghost Stories, Jeff Lemire (Top Shelf)
20. Graphic Witness: Four Wordless Graphic Novels, George A Walker ed (Firefly)
—–
21. Never Wink at a Worried Woman, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
22. the great hopeful someday, Elisabeth Belliveau (Conundrum Press)
23. The New Frontier 2, Darwyn Cooke (DC)
24. The New Frontier 1, Darwyn Cooke (DC)
25. Paul Goes Fishing, Michel Rabagliati (D+Q)
26. She’s Turning into One of Them, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
27. Just One More Hug, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
28. White Rapids, Pascal Blanchet (D+Q)
29. I Never Liked You, Chester Brown (D+Q)
30. Hall of Best Knowledge, Ray Fenwick (Fantagraphics)

The first appearance of Ray Fenwick on the list, who has recently been featured in the Weekend Post.