The finalists for the 2009 Doug Wright Awards are:

Best Book

Burma Chronicles Guy Delisle (Drawn & Quarterly)
Drop-in Dave Lapp (Conundrum Press)
Paul Goes Fishing Michel Rabagliati (Drawn & Quarterly)
Skim Jillian & Mariko Tamaki (Groundwood Books)

Best Emerging Talent

Kate Beaton (History Comics)
Caitlin Black (Maids of the Mist)
Jesse Jacobs (Blue Winter, Shapes in the Snow)
Jason Kieffer (Kieffer #2)
Nick Maandag (Jack & Mandy)

The Pigskin Peters Award

Hall of Best Knowledge Ray Fenwick (Fantagraphics)
Ojingogo Matthew Forsythe (Drawn & Quarterly)
All We Ever Do is Talk About Wood Tom Horacek (Drawn & Quarterly)

Small Victories Jesse Jacobs (self-published)

Established in 2008, the Pigskin Peters Award recognizes avant-garde Canadian comics and other non-traditional works. The award is named after an iconic character in the classic comic strip Birdseye Center by cartoonist Jimmie Frise. In 1948, Doug Wright inherited Frise's strip following the elder cartoonist's untimely death and would continue to draw it for the next two decades — a fact that symbolically ties the award to the DWAs overall mission.

In 2009, the Best Emerging Talent and Best Book categories were adjudicated by;

Bob Rae (the Member of Parliament for Toronto Centre and 21st premier of Ontario),

Andrew Coyne (national editor for Maclean's and political panelist on CBC Television's The National),

Martin Levin (books editor for The Globe and Mail and contributor to What I Meant to Say),

cartoonist Joe Ollmann (author of the 2007 DWA Best Book This Will All End in Tears), and

cartoonist Diana Tamblyn, the Ignatz-nominated author of several mini-comics including The Rosie Stories and There You Were.

Read about previous winners...

Learn more about Doug Wright and the Wright Awards...