Victoria authors A.T. Woodley and Julie Lawson and Salt Spring Island illustrator Mike Deas are among the nominees for the 2024 Canadian Children’s Book Centre Awards.
The winners of eight major awards celebrating Canadian books for young people will be announced Oct. 28 during an event held at the Toronto Reference Library, with $108,500 in prize money to be awarded.
The Boy Who Woke the Sun, written by Woodley from Victoria and illustrated by Mike Deas from Salt Spring Island, is about a fantastical world controlled by evil butterflies. It is competing for the Jean Little First-Novel Award, while Lawson’s Out of the Dark — which touches on the Halifax explosion and Spanish flu — is up for the Geoffrey Bilson Award for Historical Fiction for Young People.
Both come with a $5,000 cash prize.
