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.
Top 30 Comics and Graphic Novels in Canada
1. (1) Watchmen, Moore/Gibbons (DC)
2. (2) Fruits Basket 21, Takaya Natsuki (Tokyopop)
3. (4) Garfield Spills the Beans, Jim Davis (Random House)
4. (3) Naruto 32, Masashi Kishimoto (VIZ)
5. (-) Bleach 24, Tite Kubo (VIZ)
6. (10) Marvel Chronicle, Tom DeFalco (DK)
7. (6) Naruto 31, Masashi Kishimoto (VIZ)
8. (7) Home Sweat Home, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
9. (23) Louis Riel, Brown (D+Q)
10. (9) Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle 19, Clamp (Random House)
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11. (8) Simpsons Comics Dollars To Donuts, Groening et al (Harpercollins)
12. (11) Che, Rodriguez/Buhle (Verso)
13. (27) Death Note 1, Ohba/Obata (VIZ)
14. (-) Bionicle 1, Elliott/Farshtey (St. Martin’s)
15. (15) Skim, Mariko Tamaki/Jillian Tamaki (Groundwood)
16. (12) V for Vendetta, Moore/Lloyd (DC)
17. (13) Pokemon: Diamond and Pearl Adventure 2, Shigekatsu Ihara (VIZ)
18. (19) 30 Years of Laughs & Lasagna, Jim Davis (Random House)
19. (25) Bionicle 2: Challenge of the Rahkshi! Elliott/Farshtey (St. Martin’s)
20. (-) Marvel Encyclopedia (DK)
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21. (14) Simpsons Treehouse Horror, Groening et al (HarperCollins)
22. (-) Daniel X Alien Hunter, Patterson/Gout/Lyngeled (Little, Brown)
23. (30) Persepolis 1, Satrapi (Pantheon)
24. (16) Naruto 1, Masashi Kishimoto (VIZ)
25. (-) Asterix the Gaul, Goscinny/Uderzo (Orion)
26. (-) Maus 1, Spiegelman (Knopf)
27. (20) The Joker (Hardcover), Azzarello/Bermejo (DC)
28. (-) Vampire Knight 1, Matsuri Hino (VIZ)
29. (-) Dilbert: This Is the Part Where You Pretend to Add Value, Adams (Andrews McMeel)
30. (-) Red: The Heroic Rescue, Ted Dekker (Thomas Nelson)
Standard explanation: 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: More perennial faves like Asterix start taking up more space, and new annual collections of popular strip and cartoon show comics (Dilbert) start showing up on more people’s radar.
In total, BookManager lists over 4000 graphic novels, trades, and strip collections. It is a wondrous, scary place, where everyone from Lynda Barry to Wolverine 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. (1) Home Sweat Home, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
2. (2) Skim, Mariko Tamaki/Jillian Tamaki (Groundwood)
3. (3) Louis Riel, Chester Brown (D+Q)
4. (6) Big Foot, Graham Roumieu (Plume)
5. (5) Senior’s Discount, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
6. (6) The Burma Chronicles, Guy Delisle (D+Q)
7. (-) Ojingogo, Matt Forsythe (D+Q)
8. (33) Drop-In, Dave Lapp (Conundrum)
9. (8) It’s a Good Life, If You Don’t Weaken, Seth (D+Q)
9. (7) Just One More Hug, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
10. (14) Hall of Best Knowledge, Ray Fenwick (Fantagraphics)
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11. (15) The New Frontier 1, Darwyn Cooke (DC)
12. (18) Essex County 1: Tales from the Farm, Jeff Lemire (Top Shelf)
13. (19) The Plain Janes, Cecil Castellucci et al, (DC/Minx)
14. (22) Strange and Stranger, Blake Bell (Fanta)
15. (21) Scott Pilgrim 4, Bryan Lee O’Malley (Oni)
16. (9) Scott Pilgrim 1, Bryan Lee O’Malley (Oni)
17. (30) Never Wink at a Worried Woman, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
18. (-) the great hopeful someday, Elizabeth Belliveau (Conundrum)
19. (10) Dramacon Ultimate Edition, Svetlana Chmakova (Tokyopop)
20. (13) The Big 5-0, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
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21. (12) Last Straw, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel
22. (25) Rex Libris: I, Librarian, James Turner (Slave Labor Graphics)
23. (26) Middle Age Spread, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
24. (28) Essex County 2: Ghost Stories, Jeff Lemire (Top Shelf)
25. (29) Graphic Witness: Four Wordless Graphic Novels, George A Walker ed (Firefly)
26. (17) Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea, Guy Delisle (D+Q)
27. (-) Pohadky, Colek (D+Q)
28. (-) 363 Days, Julie Doucet (D+Q)
29. (-) There Goes My Baby, Lynn Johnston (Andrews McMeel)
30. (-) Witness My Shame, Shary Boyle (Conundrum)