Items17The creator’s order
  1. 1The Complete Maus: A Survivor's Tale (1997)The Complete Maus: A Survivor's Tale (1997)Published Jan 1, 1997Won: Special Pulitzer Prize, 1992. The Pulitzer board honored Art Spiegelman's account of his father's survival of Auschwitz with a special award rather than a prize in one of its book categories. That awkwardness is the point: it is the moment a major American literary institution admitted a…0
  2. 2Jimmy Corrigan (1999)Jimmy Corrigan (1999) 6.9/10 on Open LibraryPublished Jan 1, 1999Won: Guardian First Book Award, 2001; also an American Book Award. The first graphic novel to win a major British literary prize, and it beat prose debuts to do it. Chris Ware follows lonely, middle-aged Jimmy as he meets the father who abandoned him, with a parallel story of Jimmy's grandfather…0
  3. 3Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic (2006)Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic (2006)Published Jan 1, 2006Shortlisted: National Book Critics Circle Award, autobiography, 2006. Alison Bechdel's memoir of growing up in a family funeral business, and of the closeted father whose death she spends the book trying to read, earned its place among prose memoirs on the critics' shortlist and topped Time's…0
  4. 4American Born Chinese (2006)American Born Chinese (2006)Published Jan 1, 2006Shortlisted: National Book Award for Young People's Literature, 2006. Won: Michael L. Printz Award, 2007. Gene Luen Yang's book was the first graphic novel to reach a National Book Award shortlist, and then the first to win the Printz, the American Library Association's top prize for young adult…0
  5. 5The Arrival (2006)The Arrival (2006) 9.6/10 on Open LibraryPublished Jan 1, 2006Won: Book of the Year, NSW Premier's Literary Awards, 2007. A book with no words at all took the overall prize at one of Australia's leading literary awards. Shaun Tan's wordless graphic novel follows a man who leaves his family to build a life in a strange new country, where the writing, the…0
  6. 6Dotter of Her Father's Eyes (2012)Dotter of Her Father's Eyes (2012)Published Jan 1, 2012Won: Costa Biography Award, 2012. The first graphic work to win a Costa Award, in a year when the Costa judges shortlisted two graphic novels. Mary Talbot sets her own childhood with a cold, Joyce-obsessed scholar father beside the life of Lucia Joyce, James Joyce's daughter, whose ambitions as a…0
  7. 7Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant? (2014)Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant? (2014) 8.8/10 on Open LibraryPublished Jan 1, 2014Won: National Book Critics Circle Award, autobiography, 2014. Shortlisted: National Book Award for Nonfiction, 2014. Eight years after Fun Home reached the critics' autobiography shortlist, a graphic memoir won the prize outright, and it took the first Kirkus Prize for nonfiction as well. New…0
  8. 8This One Summer (2014)This One Summer (2014)Published Jan 1, 2014Won: Governor General's Literary Award, children's literature (illustration), 2014. Honors: Caldecott Honor and Printz Honor, 2015. The first graphic novel the Caldecott committee ever honored, and a Governor General's winner for Jillian Tamaki's art in Canada. Cousins Mariko and Jillian Tamaki…0
  9. 9The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye (2016)The Art of Charlie Chan Hock Chye (2016)Published Jan 1, 2016Won: Singapore Literature Prize, English fiction, 2016. The first graphic novel to win the prize's English fiction category, and a win with an edge: Singapore's National Arts Council had withdrawn a publishing grant the year before, saying the book's retelling of history could undermine the…0
  10. 10March. Book Three (2016)March. Book Three (2016) 8.5/10 on Open LibraryPublished Jan 1, 2016Won: National Book Award for Young People's Literature, 2016; Michael L. Printz Award, Coretta Scott King Author Award and Sibert Medal, 2017. The first book to win both the National Book Award and the Printz, and the moment the trilogy's run of honors peaked. Congressman John Lewis tells his own…0