COMICS - Young Adult 2026

WINNER

Sentimental Kiss

Title: Sentimental Kiss
English title: Sentimental Kiss
Author: Camille Van Hoof
Illustration: Camille Van Hoof
Publisher: L'employé du moi
Year: 2025
Country/Region: Belgium

Charlie and Anima are the protagonists of Camille Van Hoof’s first graphic novel, dedicated to the delicate transition to adolescence, when love and sexuality burst into the lives of teenagers without warning - traditionally over the course of a summer. Sentimental Kiss is a delicate love story set in everyday life, with occasional shifts of the characters into a fantasy world, where they experiment with new and almost magical powers. In this realm, new ways of sharing intimacy call for new codes of communication – including that of consent – to make bodies speak to one another. Awkward and never-before-experienced gestures, big feelings and hidden emotions alternate with moments of introspection. Everything finds a perfect balance in the narrative, guided by authentic dialogues and the intensity of pop colors that contrast with a subtle and deliberately imperfect line, perfectly capturing the delicate nature of the age of uncertainty, when possibilities for self-discovery seem infinite.

Vieillle (Old Girl)

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Vieillle (Old Girl)

Title: Vieille
English title: Old Girl
Author: Delphine Panique
Illustration: Delphine Panique
Publisher: MISMA
Year: 2025
Country/Region: Francia

She is old, she is alone, often silent, sometimes grumpy, always surprising and wildly contemporary… Beware of this little round, slow, wrinkled woman who pushes her shopping cart around with a mischievous smile. You may fall under the spell of this sarcastic granny, who questions her life and a world that is becoming more and more blurred to her eyes. With her literary background and sharp writing style, cartoonist Delphine Panique creates poetic, absurd, and socially conscious comic strips with all the delicacy of her minimalist style. Vieille takes a fresh and humorously scathing look at the lives of older women, who are often made invisible by society, and questions the ways we treat or ignore them. A book suitable for 14 to 144 year olds.

Nobody in Walled City

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Nobody in Walled City

Title: Nobody in Walled City
English title: Nobody in Walled City
Author: Rex Koo
Illustration: Rex Koo
Publisher: Kedama Sha
Year: 2025
Country/Region: Hong Kong - China

The story of a frozen world where mutation becomes the only means of survival. It seems like a classic dystopian tale, but Rex Coo goes beyond stereotypes and creates a story that is relevant to the times we live in: transformation is not an emergency, but an essential element of every being, to the point that humans can become animals and vice versa. Beyond the plot, the books stands out for its strong visual impact, playing on the relationship between black and white and sudden bursts of color, and for its original style, reworking highly expressive Asian motifs in a way that is both harsh and refined. This book is a precious object in every detail of its creation.

L'autobus incantato (The Enchanted Bus)

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L'autobus incantato (The Enchanted Bus)

Title: L'autobus incantato
English title: The Enchanted Bus
Author: Majid Bita
Illustration: Majid Bita
Publisher: Canicola Edizioni
Year: 2025
Country/Region: Italy

In the Winter of 1996, a group of Iranian intellectuals in Tehran were invited to a conference in Armenia. Majid Bita tells the story of their harrowing journey through the mountains and their mysterious fate, with deep humanity. It is a powerful and ambitious graphic novel that offers a window into the culture and history of political repression in Iran. Bita illustrates the story with visceral black and white drawings that make this book a visual tour de force.