The French editions of Kate Beaton’s Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands and James Tynion IV, Álvaro Martínez Bueno, and Jordie Bellaire’s The Nice House on the Lake made the Selection in the running for the 2024 Fnac-France Inter Prix de BD. Finalists will be announced December 7, 2023, and winner revealed January 11, 2024.
Announcing the twenty-book selection, Fnac-France Inter said:
“Created to promote the ninth art in all its diversity, the Fnac-France Inter Prix de BD aims to promote artistic creation and new authors to the general public. And so, for the sixth year, the literary competition presents itself and unveils the 20 comics in the running”
Kate Beaton’s Ducks: Two Years on the Oil Sands – translated as Environnement Toxique [tr. ‘Toxic Environment’] by Alice Marchand and published by Casterman -released in French in March this year, some six months after the 2022 English language release from Drawn & Quarterly. The Nice House on the Lake was serialised in 12-issues by DC between June 2021 and December 2022; the French editions of the collections, translated by Maxime Le Dain, were released in January and March 2023 by Urban Comics. The two works have already received significant acclaim in the English language, not least achieving Eisner Awards, so it will be interesting to see how they perform in the French critical landscape.
Aside from the two familiar names in the Selection for the 2024 Fnac-France Inter Prix de BD, there are a number of other interesting titles – from a reportage about an Auschwitz survivor on her final visit to the camp age 95 (Ginette Kolinka et al’s Adieu Birkenau), to the charming fictional exploits of a young girl and her dream to become a witch (Jérôme Pélissier and Carine Hinder‘s Brume). There are a mix of murder mysteries ranging from the humourous (Jordi Lafebre‘s Je Suis Leur Silence; tr. ‘I Am Their Silence’) to the macabre (Carlos Portela & Keko‘s Contrition). There is also light magical realism (Zelba‘s Le Grand Incident and Kid Toussaint & Aurélie Guarin‘s Les Vies de Charlie; tr. ‘The Lives of Charlie‘), and adaptations of classic novels such as Milo Manara‘s take on Umberto Eco‘s Name of the Rose, and Georges Bess on Victor Hugo‘s Hunchback of Notre Dame. And that’s not to mention a Marjane Satrapi-edited anthology of all-stars about the women’s rights protests in Iran.
The Prix de BD has been run by major French retail chain Fnac and France Inter radio station since 2018 (winner awarded in January of the following year). Twenty books are selected by Fnac booksellers and France Inter editorial staff for the selection; finalists are decided by a public jury of thirty readers plus five French Culture Pass members; a final professional jury – chaired by France Inter radio presenter Rebecca Manzoni, specialist journalists and Fnac booksellers – decide the winner. The 2024 Prix de BD is eligible to all books released in 2023.
The January award announcement each year coincides with Fnac stores’ “Month of Comics” (“Mois de la BD”), where comics are placed more prominently on display in stores. Following declaration, the winning book will get additional promotion at Fnac as well as on France Inter radio – with special programming on the winning work and its author(s), including a guest spot on Manzoni’s news and culture radio show Totémic the following day.
The Fnac-France Inter Prix de BD 2023 prizewinner was Valentine Cuny-Le Callet’s Perpendiculaire au soleil [tr. Perpendicular to the Sun], a correspondence between the French author and a US death row inmate, published by Delcourt. Cuny-Le Callet’s book also won the 2022 Artémisia award for women cartoonists. It has not yet been released in English.
The Selection for the Fnac-France Inter Prix de BD 2024
Adieu Birkenau, by written by Ginette Kolinka, Jean-David Morvan, Victor Matet, art by Ricard Efa, Cesc, and Roger Sole (Albin Michel)
Brume, written by Jérôme Pélissier, art by Carine Hinder (Glenat)
Ceux Qui Me Touchent – histoire complete [Those Who Touch Me – the complete story], written by Damien Marie, art by Laurent Bonneau (Bamboo/Grand Angle)
Chumbo, by Matthia Lehmann (Casterman) — from the author of Parallel
Contrition, by Carlos Portela & Keko; originally published in Spanish, French translation Alexandra Carrasco (Denoël)
Environnement Toxique [Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands], Kate Beaton; English-French translation Alice Marchand (Casterman)
Femme, Vie, Liberté [‘Women, Life, Freedom’], anthology edited by Marjane Satrapi (Iconoclaste) —- Featuring the work of Joann Sfar, Coco, Mana Neyestani, Catel, Pascal Rabaté, Patricia Bolanos, Paco Roca, Bahareh Akrami, Hippolyte, Shabnam Adiban, Lewis Trondheim, Deloupy, Touka Neyestani, Bee, Winshluss, Nicolas Wild, and Hamoun.
Frontier, by Guillaume Singelin (Rue de Sevres) — Singelin’s earlier work PTSD was published by First Second in 2019
Je Suis Leur Silence [‘I Am Their Silence‘], by Jordi Lafebre (Dargaud) — from the author of Always Never.
L’Ombre Des Lumières, tome 1: L’Ennemi du genre humain [‘The Shadow of Light, volume 1: The Enemy of Mankind‘], written by Alain Ayroles, art by Richard Guérineau (Delcourt)
La Brute et le Divin [‘The Brutal and the Divine‘], by Léonard Chemineau (Rue de Sevres)
La Femme à l’Étoile [‘Woman with a Star‘], by Anthony Pastor (Casterman)
La Marche Brume [The Mist-Walker], by Fert Stéphane (Dargaud) — digital edition available in English from Europe Comics
Le Grand Incident [‘The Great Incident‘], by Zelba (Futuropolis)
Le Nom de la Rose [The Name of the Rose], Umberto Eco, adapted by Milo Manara (Glenat)
Les Guerres de Lucas [‘The Wars of Lucas‘], written by Laurent Hopman, art by Renaud Roche (Deman) — graphic novel about director George Lucas
Les Vies de Charlie [‘The Lives of Charlie‘], written by Kid Toussaint, art by Aurélie Guarin (Dupuis)
Victor Hugo‘s Notre-Dame de Paris [Hunchback of Notre Dame], adapted by Georges Bess (Glenat)
Shiki: 4 Saisons au Japon [‘Shiki: 4 Seasons in Japan’], Rosalie Stroesser (Rivages)
The Nice House on the Lake, written by James Tynion IV, art by Álvaro Martínez Bueno, colours by Jordie Bellaire; English-French translation Maxime Le Dain (Urban Comics)
