Stacey May Fowles

Alcuin Society picks best-designed books of 2008
The Alcuin Society has announced the winners of its 27th annual Awards for Excellence in Book Design in Canada. The judges, Frank Newfeld, Alan Stein, and E.A. Hobart (Zab), selected 32 winning titles from 233 entries, 7 provinces, and 89 publishers. In some categories, the judges chose to award a Fourth prize in addition to, or instead of, Honourable mention. There were two categories this year (Prose Non-fiction and Reference) where a First prize was not awarded.

“Designers, illustrators, typographers, printers, writers and publishers have collaborated to bring together words, images, type, paper and binding, to express themselves in these works of art,” commented Leah Gordon, Alcuin Society Board member and Design Competition Committee Chair. “All the entries demonstrate that there’s nothing like the look and feel of a well-designed book.”

The winning books will be shown across Canada and exhibited at the Tokyo International Book Fair in Japan, and the Frankfurt and Leipzig International Book Fairs. They will compete in the biggest annual book-design competition in the world, in Leipzig, Germany, in February 2010. This year’s winners are:

PROSE FICTION
First prize: JESSICA SULLIVAN, designer of Revenant, by Tristan Hughes (Douglas & McIntyre)
Second prize: ANDREW STEEVES AT GASPEREAU PRESS, designer of That Tune Clutches My Heart, by Paul Headrick (Gaspereau Press)
Third prize: MEGAN FILDES, designer of Fear of Fighting, by Stacey May Fowles (Invisible Publishing).