by BK Munn
Cartoonist Jillian Tamaki has been nominated for a Governor General’s Literary Award for her children’s book, They Say Blue. The book is nominated in the category Young People’s Literature – Illustrated Books. It previously won a U.S. Caldecott Honour.
Tamaki previously won in the category in 2014 for her contributions to the graphic novel This One Summer, which she co-created with her writer cousin Mariko Tamaki. Her first nomination in 2008 resulted in some controversy over the problems of dividing credit for collaborative comics work, as enumerated in an open letter from many of Tamaki’s peers.
The Governor General’s Awards are among the most prestigious book prizes in Canada, with winners taking home $25000.
They Say Blue is described by publisher Groundwood Books as the story of “a young girl as she contemplates colours in the known and the unknown, in the immediate world and the world beyond what she can see.”
Full list of nominees:
- Ocean Meets Sky by Eric Fan & Terry Fan
- Africville by Shauntay Grant, illustrated by Eva Campbell
- Go Show the World by Wab Kinew, illustrated by Joe Morse
- They Say Blue by Jillian Tamaki
- At the Pond by Werner Zimmermann