The winner of this year’s Dwayne McDuffie Award for Kids’ Comics was announced June 14 at the Ann Arbor Comic Arts Festival, run jointly by Kids Read Comics and the Ann Arbor (Michigan) District Library.

The 2019 winner is:

• The Cardboard Kingdom, by Chad Sell, follows a neighborhood of kids who transform ordinary cardboard into fantastical homemade costumes as they explore conflicts with friends, family, and their own identity.

The award judges are Faith Roncoroni, Tameshja Brooks, and Nola Pfau, assisted by Kids Read Comics and A2CAF co-founder Edith Donnell.

Kids Read Comics, a volunteer-run nonprofit that promotes comics reading and comics making, sponsors the award, which honors Dwayne McDuffie, pioneering comics and animation writer and Humanitas Prize winner, who cofounded Milestone Media and created the teen superhero Static among others. The award runs in tandem with the Dwayne McDuffie Award for Diversity and focuses on comics aimed at young readers.

The finalists for this year’s Dwayne McDuffie Award for Kids’ Comics were announced May 18.

Kids Read Comics, a volunteer-run nonprofit that promotes comics reading and comics making, sponsors the award, which honors Dwayne McDuffie, pioneering comics and animation writer and Humanitas Prize winner, who cofounded Milestone Media and created the teen superhero Static among others. The award runs in tandem with the Dwayne McDuffie Award for Diversity and focuses on comics aimed at young readers.

The winner will be announced June 14 at the Ann Arbor Comic Arts Festival, run jointly by Kids Read Comics and the Ann Arbor (Michigan) District Library.

The 2019 finalists are:

• Be Prepared, by Vera Brosgol, sends young Vera, a Russian girl living in an American suburb, to summer camp—Russian summer camp, the only one her single mom can afford and the one where she just might be able to fit in,
• The Cardboard Kingdom, by Chad Sell, follows a neighborhood of kids who transform ordinary cardboard into fantastical homemade costumes as they explore conflicts with friends, family, and their own identity.
• Hidden Witch, by Molly Knox Ostertag, continues the story of Asler, hero of The Witch Boy, as he takes magic lessons from his grandmother and tries to help his non-magical friend Charlie escape from a curse that’s trying to attach itself to her.
• Last Pick, by Jason Walz, takes readers to an earth overrun by alien invaders, where only those too young, too old, or too “disabled” have been spared from abduction…but maybe the kids last picked can step up and start a revolution.
• Lumberjanes: The Infernal Compass, by Lilah Sturges and polterink, finds the Janes separated during an orienteering outing, thanks to a mysterious compass that others very much want to lay their hands on.
• My Beijing: Four Stories of Everyday Wonder, by Nie Jun, introduces Yu’er and her grandpa, who live in a small neighborhood in Beijing that’s full of big personalities—with a story around every corner and a hint of magic each day.
• Onibi: Diary of a Yokai Ghost Hunter, by Atelier Sento, transports readers to the places where natural and supernatural meet, as it explores some of the lesser-known parts of Japan in a story that is part fantasy and part travelogue.
• Peter & Ernesto: A Tale of Two Sloths, by Graham Annable, tells the story of two best friends who are nothing alike—Peter loves their tree and never wants to leave, while Ernesto loves the sky and wants to see it from every place on earth.
• The Prince and the Dressmaker, by Jen Wang, finds Prince Sebastian hiding a secret life?taking Paris by storm wearing fabulous dresses as the Lady Crystallia?and relying on the brilliant young dressmaker Frances, who guards his secret but has dreams of her own.
• Sanity & Tallulah, by Molly Brooks, features best friends who live on a dilapidated space station at the end of the galaxy?but when Sanity creates a definitely-illegal-but-impossibly-cute three-headed kitten, the havoc it wreaks may mean the end of their outer space home.

The award judges are Faith Roncoroni, Tameshja Brooks, and Nola Pfau, assisted by Kids Read Comics and A2CAF co-founder Edith Donnell.

The finalists for this year’s Dwayne McDuffie Award for Kids’ Comics were announced May 2. Presented at the Ann Arbor Comics Art Festival, the award runs in tandem with the Dwayne McDuffie Award for Diversity and focuses on comics aimed at young readers.

Kids Read Comics, a volunteer-run nonprofit that promotes comics reading and comics making, sponsors the award, which honors Dwayne McDuffie, the pioneering comics and animation writer and Humanitas Prize winner who cofounded Milestone Media and created the teen superhero Static among others. The award is given out each June at the Ann Arbor Comic Arts Festival, which is run jointly by Kids Read Comics and the Ann Arbor (Michigan) District Library.

The 2018 finalists are:

• As the Crow Flies, by Melanie Gilman, features Charlie Lamonte—thirteen years old, queer, black, and questioning what was once a firm belief in God—during a summer vacation stint at an all-white Christian youth backpacking camp.
• The Backstagers Volume 1: Rebels without Applause, by James Tynion IV and Rian Sygh, follows transfer student Jory to an all-boys private high school, where he’s taken in by the only group that doesn’t treat him like a new kid, the lowly stage crew known as the Backstagers.
• Garbage Night, by Jen Lee, takes readers to a barren and ransacked post-apocalyptic suburbia, where a dog named Simon—along with his two best friends, a raccoon and a deer—scavenges for food and awaits the return of the hallowed “garbage night.”
• I am Alfonso Jones, by Tony Medina, Stacey Robinson and John Jennings, stars an African-American teen who loves to play trumpet and dreams of playing the lead in his school’s hip-hop rendition of Hamlet, but who becomes the victim of a police shooting, and watches from the afterlife as his family and friends struggle for justice.
• It’s Treason, by George! by Steve Hockensmith, Chris Kientz and Lee Nielsen, takes four friends on a time-traveling adventure to undo the work of plotters who have turned American history upside-down and replaced over two hundred years of democracy with the rule of monarchs.
• Nightlights, by Lorena Alvarez, introduces Sandy, who catches the tiny stars that appear out of the darkness each night in her bedroom, and creates wonderful creatures to play with and make drawings of…until one day a mysterious girl appears who knows all about her nighttime secrets.
• Space Battle Lunchtime Volume 2: A Recipe for Disaster, by Natalie Reiss, ushers in the season finale of Space Battle Lunchtime, but finalist Peony (the only Earth contestant) is nowhere to be found—she’s been kidnapped and taken to the set of her show’s biggest rival, Cannibal Coliseum, where chefs compete to cook…each other!
• The Tea Dragon Society, by Katie O’Neill, tells the story of Greta, a blacksmith apprentice, who becomes entwined in the enchanting world of tea dragons—discovering a lost tea dragon in the marketplace, and learning the dying art form of tea dragon caretaking from a pair of kind tea shop owners.
• Where’s Halmoni? by Julie Kim, joins a young Korean girl and boy on a search for their missing grandmother—a search that leads them into a fantastical world inspired by Korean folklore, complete with mischievous goblins, a greedy tiger, a clever rabbit, and a wily fox.
• Witch Boy, by Molly Knox Ostertag, finds thirteen-year-old Aster up against the rules of his magical family, where all girls are raised to be witches and boys grow up to be shapeshifters—for instead of conforming, Aster doesn’t shift, and continues to pursue his fascination with witchery…no matter how forbidden that might be.

The award judges are Alenka Figa, Ardo Omer and Shayauna Glover.

[Thanks to Cat Eldridge for the story.]

The judges for the Dwayne McDuffie Award for Kids’ Comics are asking for your help in assembling a longlist of worthy books from 2017. They’re taking nominations until March 1.

Presented at the Ann Arbor Comics Art Festival, the award runs in tandem with the Dwayne McDuffie Award for Diversity and focuses on comics aimed at young readers.

The judges are looking for comics that are both original and timeless (even when addressing the issues of the day), and that represent a wide range of experiences, whether in this world or a totally imagined one. We’re well aware that the more diverse the subject matter and voices of the nominees, the greater the opportunity to select books that are truly the best of the best for the award shortlist and the ultimate winner.
If you read and loved a 2017 comic – or two, or five – and want to nominate it, please email us at [email protected]. The book you nominate can be an original publication or a collection of a series. And books can be published anywhere in the world, but should be available in English.

Kids Read Comics, a volunteer-run nonprofit that promotes comics reading and comics making, sponsors the award, which honors Dwayne McDuffie, the pioneering comics and animation writer and Humanitas Prize winner who cofounded Milestone Media and created the teen superhero Static among others. The award is given out each June at the Ann Arbor Comic Arts Festival, which is run jointly by Kids Read Comics and the Ann Arbor (Michigan) District Library.