CBC’s The Next Chapter

Gamerville, Johnnie Christmas's new graphic novel, explores friendship and pushing your boundaries

The author and illustrator discussed his new graphic novel with Christa Couture on The Next Chapter.
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Kirkus Reviews: Johnnie Christmas Wants Kids To Connect

hen comics creator Johnnie Christmas released his first book for young readers, Swim Team (HarperAlley, 2022), he went beyond a simple sports story to explore Black America’s fraught history with swimming. In Gamerville (HarperAlley, July 16), his second middle-grade graphic novel, he flexes those same muscles to deliver a multilayered narrative that’s really several stories at once.
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Quill & Quire

Johnnie Christmas, author of Swim Team, returns with Gamerville (HarperAlley, July 16). Christmas’s sophomore graphic novel follows Max Lightning as he tries to escape Camp Reset, where electronics are forbidden, and fulfill his dream of winning the multiplayer video game Lone Wolf of Calamity Bay at the Gamerville championship.
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The New York Times

Memory, both individual and collective, is vital to connecting multiple generations of “swim sisters” in “Swim Team,” a sparkler of a middle grade graphic novel from the comics creator Johnnie Christmas.
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Left: cover of Swim Team. Right: Johnnie Christmas

CBC Books: How I Wrote It

Bestselling author Johnnie Christmas has an interesting history with water. As a child, an incident where he almost drowned left him with a fear of the water and a reluctance to learn how to swim. It wasn't until taking swim lessons as an adult that his relationship with the water began to change.
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CBC: Johnnie Christmas brings Atwood's vision to life

As the artist behind comics like Sheltered and Pisces, Johnnie Christmas is no stranger to the weird and fantastic. Even when faced with the task of drawing a cat/bird/human superhero, the brainchild of a world-famous literary icon, he's far from phased. 
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Left: Cover of Angel Catbird. Right: Johnnie Christmas works in his studio.


Johnnie Christmas works at his studio.

Globe & Mail: B.C. comic artist pairs with Atwood for Angel Catbird series

Vancouver-based comic-book artist Johnnie Christmas is 15 pages into drawing his latest project – a three-volume comic-book series called Angel Catbird that is being written by Margaret Atwood.
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