Louis Undercover
It looks like fall will be a strong season for graphica, with a bevy of titles that should hold wide appeal. Lumberjanes: Unicorn Power! (Amulet Books) is Mariko Tamaki’s highly anticipated first instalment in a new middlegrade series based on the popular comic. The Caldecott and Printz Honor winner is joined in her endeavour by original Lumberjanes co-creator Brooke Allen, who maintains her role as illustrator. • From HighWater press comes A Girl Called Echo: The Pemmican Wars by Governor General’s Literary Award–winning poet Katherena Vermette, whose novel, The Break, was a finalist for t he 2017 edition of CBC Reads. Scott B. Henderson provides the visuals for the new book, in which 13-year-old Métis girl Echo finds herself slipping backward and forward through time to experience the titular 19th-century conflict first hand. • With illustrations by Toronto’s Dmitry Bondarenko, archival photos and documents, and text by documentary filmmaker Ryan Barnett, The Raftsmen (Firefly) brings the story of the first crew to cross the Atlantic by raft to light for the first time in 60 years. • David Homel translates Julie Maroh’s follow up to her lauded graphic novel Blue is the Warmest Colour. The Montreal-set Body Music (Arsenal Pulp), explores love and desire between people of various backgrounds and inclinations in 20 intimate vignettes. • Inhabit Media co-founder Louise Flaherty draws on her Inuit heritage and the stories of her childhood for The Gnawer of Rocks, illustrated by Chicago freelance artist Jim Nelson, which tells of two girls who wander away from their camp and find themselves trapped in a cave with the titular monster. • Groundwood is betting Louis Undercover, the second collaboration from Fanny Britt and Isabelle Arsenault, will be just as successful as the duo’s lauded Jane, the Fox and Me, which won the Governor General’s Literary Award for illustration for its original French edition and two Joe Shuster Awards for the English version. Christelle Morelli and Susan Ouriou once again handle translation.
The Raftsmen