One of three books to be nominated in five categories, Chris Ware’s Building Stories, which was nominated for Best New Graphic Novel, led the list of nominees for the 25th annual Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards released today by the San Diego Comic-con International. The 2013 Eisner Awards—the National Book Awards of the comics industry— honor the best work and artists in comics and graphic novel publishing in the previous year. Ware’s five nominations led all individual artists and Fantagraphics Books led publishers with 24 nominations.
Also nominated in five categories are Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips’s Fatale (Image) and Matt Fraction and David Aja’s Hawkeye (Marvel). In addition to Ware’s Building Stories, which was also one of PW’s Top Ten Best Books of 2012, other books nominated for Best Graphic Album New, were Goliath by Tom Gauld (D&Q), The Hive by Charles Burns (also from Pantheon), Unterzakhn by Leela Corman (Schocken) and You’ll Never Know, Book 3: A Soldiers Heart by C. Tyler (Fantagraphics).
Nominations in other book-related Eisner categories included Everything Together: Collected Stories, by Sammy Harkham (PictureBox), Sailor Twain, or The Mermaid in the Hudson by Mark Siegel (First Second) and Heads or Tails, by Lilli Carré (Fantagraphics) for Best Graphic Album Reprint. Among the titles nominated for Best Publication for Teens are A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L’Engle, adapted by Hope Larson (FSG), and Adventure Time: Marceline and the Scream Queens, by Meredith Gran (kaboom!). Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples Saga (Image) and Adventure Time, by Ryan North, Shelli Paroline, and Braden Lamb (kaboom!) were nominated for Best New Series. Harvey Pekar's Cleveland by Joe Remnant (Zip Comics/Top Shelf) and Bandette by Colleen Coover (Monkeybrain) for Best Pencil/Inker/letterer. Among the nonfiction nominations for Best Reality Based Work were A Chinese Life by li Kunwu and P. Otie (Self Made Hero, Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michaelangelo & Me by Ellen Forney (Gotham Books) and The Carter Family: Don’t Forget This Song by Frank M. Young and David Lasky (Abrams ComicArts).
Click on the link for a complete list of nominations for the 25th annual Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards
The judges for this year’s Eisner Awards were reviewer Michael Cavna (“Comic Riffs,” Washington Post), academic/author Charles Hatfield (Cal State Northridge), retailer Adam Healy (Cosmic Monkey, Portland, OR), author/educator Katie Monnin (Teaching Graphic Novels), cartoonist/critic Frank Santoro (Storeyville; TCJ), and Comic-Con International registrar John Smith. The Eisner Comic Industry Awards are named after the great comics innovator Will Eisner, and they will be presented at a gala awards ceremony that will be held on July 19 at the San Diego Comic-Con International.
