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Alex Taylor Wins The UK First Graphic Novel Award 2023

Alex Taylor, also known as azbt, has won the First Graphic Novel Award 2023, presented tonight at Waterstones Picadilly in London.

Alex Taylor, also known as azbt, has won the First Graphic Novel Award 2023, presented tonight at Waterstones Picadilly in London, where the seven shortlisted entrants showed their work. Publisher Emma Hayley, whose company SelfMadeHero will award the winner a contract for publication, said, "The fun and colourful art style belies the intricate plot lines of this coming-of-age queer thriller set in a ramen shop. Crafted with vigour and spirit, the creator takes us on a somewhat crazy yet wonderful journey that is tasty from beginning to end".

Alex Taylor is a queer visual artist living in London, working in illustration, painting, digital art, comics, zines, and film. Bone Broth is "a coming-of-age queer thriller, following Ash, a young transmasculine queer person, starting his first job in a ramen shop. As he begins to learn the process of making bone broth ramen, he suddenly finds himself caught up in how to cover up the death of his boss after a staff party.

Emma Hayley of Uk graphic novel publisher SelfMadeHero, will offer the winning author a contract for publication and the Bks Agency, sponsors an additional £500 cash prize for the winner, and agent James Spackman read and gave feedback to all longlisted authors. As well as Hayley, the other judges were artist and graphic novelist Sabba Khan; contemporary artist Mark Wallinger, Cartoon Museum Learning Officer Steve Marchant, editor and writer Ayoola Solarin, broadcast journalist Alex Fitch, and award director Corinne Pearlman.

The award was open to artists, writers and comic creators who are UK residents and have not had a longform graphic novel commercially published before. Nearly a third of entrants were from European or other backgrounds. There was an even spread of ages, ranging from 18 to over 65, and just over half were from outside London and the southeast. Over half the 170 entries were by women.

The First Graphic Novel award is a partnership between the publisher SelfMadeHero, the Cartoon Museum, and award director Corinne Pearlman. It was previously known as the Myriad First Graphic Novel Competition. Myriad's Graphics list includes the four previous winners and six other books by shortlisted authors. Three of the authors selected this year – Cathy Brett, Anna Trench and Myfanwy Tristram – were also shortlisted for the previous competitions.

Corinne Pearlman, award director, and founder of the prize, said: "The diversity of subject matter as well as the talent and effort displayed by all 171 entrants has been truly remarkable. The strength of our longlist as well as our shortlist shows the wealth of comic talent in the UK."

The other shortlisted nominees are below:

• Gareth Cowlin's The Hiraeth Club. Gerald Preston works at Wattersons Booksellers, and lives with a hole in his chest, a physical manifestation of 'hiraeth', a Welsh word meaning 'irretrievable loss'. Sister Jenny died some 20 years ago, and Gerald recruits customers and colleagues to explore that hole in his life.
• Cathy Brett's Mrs Thorwald. What really happened to Mrs Thorwald, the 'nagging New York housewife', who apparently murdered and dismembered by her adulterous husband? Here's the story the neighbours couldn't see, a 3D illustration picture book inspired by Hitchcock's 'Rear Window'.
• Mereida Fajardo's Zayani Zam. A silent graphic novel about loneliness and connection on the Mongolian coal road. It follows a day in the life of a female truck driver who spends every day driving coal from the mines at Tavan Tolgoi to the Chinese border, yearning for the freedom of a nomadic life that no longer exists.
• Myfanwy Tristram's The Noisy Valley. True stories of protest from the Rhondda Valley in South Wales. A response to current-day politics and the erosion of our rights to protest, the author interviews local people and shares their stories – and bears witness to a rich culture of those who don't take things lying down.
• Anna Trench's Florrie. A queer, historical graphic novel about love and women's football in 1920s Europe. When Florrie's great-great-niece discovers Florrie was a footballer in the early twentieth century, she unearths a secret history both on and off the pitch. In 1921, the FA banned women's matches.
• Corban Wilkin's The Infinite Benefits Of Shame. 'Most people living with gender incongruence don't transition. Many never talk to anyone about how they feel, and repress it forever.' A contemporary graphic novel about the relationship between a young man and his gender-non-conforming lover.

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