Booksellers’ picks of the year: art and photography

Joshua Knelman’s non-fiction account of the underground art theft market has been a top title in art books this year, according to Canadian booksellers contacted by Q&Q. McNally Robinson buyer Gord Arthur says Hot Art: Chasing Thieves and Detectives through the Secret World of Stolen Art (Douglas & MacIntyre) has been especially popular at the store’s Winnipeg location, which held a launch event for the book.

Other best-selling art and photography books in 2011 tend to skew local. William Kurelek: The Messenger (Roundhouse Publishing), edited by Tobi Bruce, Mary Jo Hughes, and Andrew Kear, has been a hit in Winnipeg this year, Arthur says. He adds that the collection of essays about the Manitoba painter has likely experienced a sales bump due to a Kurelek exhibition at the Winnipeg Art Gallery that will travel across Canada in 2012.

At Oscar’s Art Books in Vancouver, regional photographer Fred Herzog’s new collection, Photographs (Douglas & McIntyre), has been extremely popular. Manager Brian Fisher says high sales figures for Photographs are especially noteworthy, given that a Chapters branch across the street tends to scoop sales by discounting new hardcover titles.

Paperback releases of books about Tom Thomson, including The Group of Seven and Tom Thomson by David Silcox (Firefly Books) and the biography Northern Light by Roy MacGregor (Vintage Canada), have been selling well this fall. Also new in paperback, Molly Peacock’s The Paper Garden (Emblem Editions) has been a best bet for booksellers.

Booksellers’ picks of the year: crime and mystery

The third instalment of Alan Bradley’s Flavia de Luce series, A Red Herring Without Mustard (Doubleday Canada), is one of the most popular crime and mystery titles of 2011, according to booksellers contacted by Q&Q.

Two other new books from established authors, Louise Penny’s A Trick of the Light (St. Martin’s Press/Raincoast) and Peter Robinson’s Before the Poison (McClelland & Stewart), are also among booksellers’ top 2011 crime and mystery titles.

A lesser-known Ontario author, retired aeronautical professional Liam Dwyer, has been one of the year’s top-selling authors at The Sleuth of Baker Street in Toronto. Co-owner Marian Misters says Murdoch in Muskoka (Muskoka Dockside Reader), a new omnibus containing the first three titles in Dwyer’s murder-mystery series, has been especially popular.

At Whodunit? Mystery Bookstore in Winnipeg, co-owner Jack Bumsted points to local author C.C. Benison’s Christmas mystery, Twelve Drummers Drumming (Doubleday Canada), as his store’s best-selling book of the year. Other top 2011 titles at Whodunit? include Q&Q book of the year The Water Rat of Wanchai and The Disciple of Las Vegas, both from Ian Hamilton’s Ava Lee series published by Spiderline, the new crime fiction imprint from House of Anansi Press.

Walter Sinclair, co-owner of Dead Write Books in Vancouver, says the best-selling 2011 books in his store have common features. “All are well-established authors, all with mysteries featuring series characters,” he says. Dead Write’s top titles this year include William Deverell’s latest Arthur Beauchamp mystery, I’ll See You in My Dreams (M&S), and the U.K. edition of Louise Penny’s Bury Your Dead (Headline/Hachette).

Booksellers’ picks of the year: graphica

Booksellers contacted by Q&Q agreed that Kate Beaton’s Hark! A Vagrant (Drawn & Quarterly) is one of the most popular graphic novels of 2011. “Kate’s Web comic is incredibly popular, and I think her very rabid fan base was anxious to own a new book by their heroine,” says Jason Grimmer, retail operations director at Montreal’s Drawn & Quarterly Bookstore.

Booksellers aren’t alone in recognizing Beaton’s appeal: Time magazine picked Hark! A Vagrant as one of their top titles of 2011 (and so did Q&Q).

Another graphic novel in high demand this year was Chester Brown’s Paying for It (D&Q), the follow-up to his 2006 book Louis Riel: A Comic-Strip Biography. “For us, [Paying for It] was probably the most awaited book in comics,” says Peter Birkemoe, owner of The Beguiling in Toronto.

Other 2011 titles with buzz include David Collier’s autobiographical Chimo (Conundrum Press) and Seth’s The Great Northern Brotherhood of Canadian Cartoonists (D&Q). Ray Fawkes’s graphic novel One Soul (Oni Press), which tells the story of 18 people’s lives, launched at The Beguiling and has become an in-store favourite. “It’s wildly experimental and really fascinating,” says manager Chris Butcher.

One Soul has also been a top seller at Strange Adventures in Halifax, along with Mike Holmes’s collection of comic-strip memoirs, True Story (Invisible Publishing). Parker: The Martini Edition by Darwyn Cooke (IDW Publishing) is also attracting attention. The collection, which includes 2008’s The Hunter and 2010’s The Outfit, has been “the one book that has gathered the most adoring looks so far this holiday season,” says owner Calum Johnston.

Booksellers’ picks of the year: LGBT

Booksellers contacted by Q&Q point to Taking My Life (Talonbooks) by Jane Rule as a top LGBT title of 2011. Rule, a member of the Order of Canada well known for her lesbian-interest fiction and non-fiction, died in 2007 but left behind a handwritten manuscript detailing her relationships and struggles with socio-cultural politics during the early years of her life. The manuscript, discovered by academic Linda M. Morra, who also edited the book, was published posthumously this summer.

Taking My Life is a sellout at Toronto Women’s Bookstore and has also been a hit at Little Sister’s Book & Art Emporium in Vancouver. “It was certainly a surprise that Jane wrote a book [about her life],” says Little Sister’s manager Janine Fuller. “It’s quite amazing for our culture.”

Both stores have also seen high sales of Persistence: All Ways Butch and Femme (Arsenal Pulp Press), a collection of personal essays on the butch/femme binary and life with an alternate gender identity, edited by Ivan E. Coyote and Zena Sharman.

At Little Sister’s, another popular 2011 title is Hold Me Now (Freehand Books), a novel by Stephen Gauer that explores the role homophobia played in a young man’s murder.

York University professor Sheila L. Cavanagh’s Queering Bathrooms: Gender, Sexuality, and the Hygienic Imagination (University of Toronto Press), a finalist for the 2011 Next Generation GLBT Indie Book Awards, has also garnered lots of positive attention, says Toronto Women’s Bookstore owner Victoria Moreno.

At Glad Day Bookshop in Toronto, manager Prodan Nedev says one of this year’s titles with buzz is Peter Knegt’s About Canada: Queer Rights (Fernwood Publishing). Another hit is Natural Order (Doubleday Canada), a novel about the relationship between a mother and her gay son by Brian Francis, whose YA debut Fruit: A Novel About a Boy and His Nipples (ECW Press) was the CBC Canada Reads runner-up in 2009.

UPDATE: Taking My Life was discovered and edited by Linda M. Morra.

Booksellers’ picks of the year: cookbooks

All the retailers Q&Q polled for their top Canadian cookbook picks are drooling over Velveeta éclairs and foie gras breakfast sandwiches, thanks to David McMillan, Frédéric Morin, and Meredith Erickson’s The Art of Living According to Joe Beef: A Cookbook of Sorts (Ten Speed Press). Inspired by the trio of trendy Montreal restaurants owned by McMillan and Morin, Joe Beef is not just a favourite for “restaurant people or those in know,” it’s also a “nice reading book,” says Barbara-jo McIntosh, owner of Vancouver’s Barbara-Jo’s Books to Cooks.

“It’s always fun when you know the place, too,” says Alison Fryer, owner of Toronto’s The Cookbook Store, who compares Joe Beef’s success to Meeru Dhalwala and Vikram Vij’s restaurant-inspired Vij’s at Home: Relax, Honey (D&M Publishers), which topped 2010 lists.

Less decadent but still delicious, according to retailers, are three popular Whitecap titles: Julie Van Rosendaal and Sue Duncan’s Spilling the Beans: Cooking and Baking with Beans and Grains Everyday, Nettie Cronish and Pat Crocker’s Everyday Flexitarian: Recipes for Vegetarians & Meat Lovers Alike, and Mairlyn Smith’s Healthy Starts Here: 140 Recipes that Will Make You Feel Great. While Jennifer McLagan’s ode to offal, Odd Bits: How to Cook the Rest of the Animal (HarperCollins Canada), might not be an average home chef’s go-to book, it’s a personal favourite with retailers.

Food Network Canada celebrities can’t be underestimated when it comes to cookbook sales. This season saw popular titles from several celebu-chefs, including Mark McEwan’s Fabbrica: Great Italian Recipes Made Easy for Home (Penguin Canada); Janet and Greta Podleski’s Looneyspoons Collection: Janet & Greta’s Greatest Recipe Hits Plus a Whole Lot More (Granet); Michael Smith’s Chef Michael Smith’s Kitchen: 100 of My Favourite Easy Recipes (Penguin Canada); and Laura Calder’s Dinner Chez Moi (HarperCollins Canada). Anna Olson’s November release, Back to Baking: 200 Timeless Recipes to Bake, Share and Enjoy (Whitecap), is already in demand. Gail Norton of Calgary’s The Cookbook Co. Cooks says the waiting list for a November baking class with Olson was “a mile long.”

However, one of the biggest cookbooks of 2011 is a leftover from last year. Quinoa 365: The Everyday Superfood by Patricia Green and Carolyn Hemming (Whitecap) is still riding high on the bestsellers’ list. Norton recalls that when Quinoa 365 was first released in April 2010 she thought former Whitecap publisher Robert McCullough was “nuts,” and conservatively ordered five. These days, she orders 20 at a time.

Book covers of the year 2011

When choosing covers of the year, the book designers Q&Q polled considered art, typography, layout, and meaning in their decisions. Allison Baggio’s Girl in Shades, Johanna Skibsrud’s This Will Be Difficult To Explain and Other Stories, and Alexi Zentner’s Touch were among designers’ favourites.

Click through the images below to see all five and read why each was chosen as a cover of the year.

Books of the year 2011: books for young people

What makes a book of the year? There’s no formula for deciding. Some are critical darlings, some are word-of-mouth favourites. Some introduce us to important new voices, some represent the best work from established authors. And some are simply exceptional works we think people will be reading and talking about for years to come. Together, these five books made the biggest impact in YA and kidlit in 2011.

Click through the images below to read why each book was chosen.

Books of the year 2011: non-fiction

What makes a book of the year? There’s no formula for deciding. Some are critical darlings, some are word-of-mouth favourites. Some introduce us to important new voices, some represent the best work from established authors. And some are simply exceptional works we think people will be reading and talking about for years to come. Together, these five books made the biggest impact in non-fiction in 2011.

Click through the images below to read why each book was chosen.

Booksellers’ picks of the year: travel

Will Ferguson’s Canadian Pie (Penguin Canada), a collection of essays and comic memoirs set across the country, has been selling well since its release in October, according to travel booksellers contacted by Q&Q.

Dwight Elliot, owner of The Travel Bug in Vancouver, says Ferguson’s backlist – including his 2005 book Hitching Rides with Buddha: Travels in Search of Japan (Vintage Canada) – continues to be popular among Canadians with wanderlust.

Elliot also pointed to John Vaillant’s The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival (Vintage Canada), published in 2010 but out in paperback this year, as a top seller. Winner of the 2011 B.C. National Award for Canadian Non-fiction and recently shortlisted for the 2012 CBC Canada Reads competition, Vaillant’s unique non-fiction thriller explores Southeastern Siberia through the story of a murderous tiger.

At Ulysses Travel Books in Montreal, best bets of 2011 include a new edition of the phrasebook Canadian French for Better Travel (Ulysses) and a series of French-language cookbooks based on the popular documentary series Les Grands Explorateurs.

Ulysses bookseller Philip Opzoomer says outdoorsy travel books have been increasingly in demand this year. Fittingly, National Geographic’s Guide to the National Parks of Canada, released to coincide with the 100th anniversary of Parks Canada in 2011, has been a hit since its release in July.

Books of the year 2011: fiction

What makes a book of the year? There’s no formula for deciding. Some are critical darlings, some are word-of-mouth favourites. Some introduce us to important new voices, some represent the best work from established authors. And some are simply exceptional works we think people will be reading and talking about for years to come. Together, these five books made the biggest impact in fiction in 2011.

Click through the images below to read why each book was chosen.