Just before the weekend the First Graphic Novel Competition announced their longlist line-up for this year. It’s a great set of names, some of whom you will recognise from recent coverage at BF. Check them out below…
The First Graphic Novel Award is delighted to announce the longlist for 2025.
The award offers the winner, or winners, the opportunity to have their completed graphic novel published by partner SelfMadeHero. It is open to all cartoonists, writers and artists who are UK residents, individually or as a team, who have not previously published a full-length graphic work. Entrants are asked for 15-20 pages of a graphic work-in-progress, fiction or non-fiction.
This year’s judges are award-winning graphic novelists Shazleen Khan, Oscar Zarate and Karrie Fransman, contemporary artist Janette Parris, and SelfMadeHero publisher Emma Hayley.
Announcing the longlist at the Lakes International Comic Arts Festival in Bowness- on-Windermere on Friday, Emma Hayley said:
‘This year the Award received a massive 220 entries, a 30% increase since 2023, giving the judges a very difficult task to choose who should go forward! I’m grateful to my fellow judges for all their hard work, and delighted that we have selected 30 entries to be longlisted for the next stage of the competition. Finally, thank you on behalf of the Award to all the entrants for sharing your time, effort and amazing comics.’
Longlisted authors will receive feedback from the judges and have their work reviewed by The bks Agency, sponsors of the £500 prize for the winner. The shortlist will be announced at the Thought Bubble Festival on 15th November, and the winner revealed at an event at Waterstones Piccadilly in January 2026.
The First Graphic Novel Award is in partnership with the Cartoon Museum, and SelfMadeHero, and is generously supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England.
The longlisted authors are:
Natalie d’Arbeloff, Cathy Brett, Yu-Ching Chiu, Sacha Cvetanovic, Alexander Morris, Millie Dobson, Leina Elgohari, Bex Gilbert, Chie Hosaka, Asia Kazub, Alanah Knibb, Lizz Lunney Hannah McCann Harriet Merry, Wes Mountain, Calico M. Netwally, Lauren O’Farrell, Judy Powell, Teresa Robertson, Richard Rudge, Graham Samels, Maria Solecki, Jenny Turner, Yanna Sapon, Lois de Silva, Joshua Sims, Jeeti Singh, Savannah Storm, Ella Stovell, Qianyu Wang (2 entries), Jess Winton, Lottie Withers.
DOUBLE ENTENDRE
Natalie d’Arbeloff
An experiment looking at a life well-lived, 95 years in the making. In this graphic autobiography, d’Arbeloff recalls and interrogates her experiences of events and adventures, whilst acquiring some useful self-knowledge along the way.
MARY & AGNES
Cathy Brett
The true story of an almost century- long friendship. Two Scottish-born 14-year-olds, after becoming pen pals in 1926, both emigrate overseas, one to Europe and the other to America. This sets them on wholly different paths – one with an unforeseeable ending.
A SLEIGH NO-ONE KNOWS
Yu-Ching Chiu
A story about the meaning of life involving a depressed rabbit, a sheep experiencing an existential crisis, and an utterly ludicrous military project. Philosophical concepts in the strangest of contexts, but somehow true to all…
2119 A TALE OF TWO CITIES
Sacha Cvetanovic, Alexander Morris
In an AI-ruled future, with Mars already settled in two city-states, two brothers are parting ways. Mechanic Oscar is bound for Saturn’s moon Titan, while his brother Finn is falling in with a dangerous crime syndicate, on a path of no return.
BIKES TO WATCH OUT FOR
Millie Dobson
The existential, off-kilter journey of one cyclist in search of the bike they’d left on campus, and how they got home again. Join in the cyclist’s solitary stream of consciousness, featuring personified groceries, arm wrestling, and zombies.
GOOD HAIR
Leina Elgohari
Hair is part of a person’s identity. It’s how you present yourself to the world, and the world responds back. This is a story of how Western norms create global attitudes, about appearance and belonging, and how people get in your head about what’s on your head.
STORY OF MY LIFE WITH ADHD
Bex Gilbert
When Bex is finally diagnosed with ADHD at 45, everything starts making sense. It’s bittersweet news: initial empowerment gives way to social stigma and frustrating medical bureaucracy. Now Bex must find the community and support she needs on her quest for understanding.
GAS
Chie Hosaka
After a somewhat embarrassing trip to the hospital, 32-year-old Tia’s farts start talking to her. And she’s moved back in with her mother. Tia has too much bottled up inside – her past, her grief… When will it find, well, release?
THE TIDE GOES OUT
Asia Kazub
In late 19th century Poland, two childhood friends – Mira and Damroka – make a pact to never be married. One day, Mira breaks this pact, but Damroka cannot let her go. As the wedding draws closer, things of myth and folklore come to life…
THREE NINES FIVE
Alanah Knibb
Recently diagnosed with Young- Onset Parkinson’s disease, Asabi moves her young family from Africa to the UK. Struggling to reconcile her changing identity with her culture, faith, and diagnosis, she turns to Aunty Tiwa – who lives with Lewy body dementia – for answers.
FORGET-ME-NOT
Lizz Lunney
Loss and memory. Growing up often comes with both. This collection of autobiographical comic essays looks back on 25 years’ worth of grief, compassion, and moments of humour to create a guide for the bereaved.
ST BRIGID & ME
Hannah McCann
Brigid: saint and goddess. In this memoir, the fight for abortion rights in her homeland of Ireland inspires the author to reconnect with Saint Brigid, and to connect the dots between traditional folklore and modern social justice.
THE SCHOOL RUN
Harriet Merry
Within the world of the family car, one mother navigates six journeys through nature: two for her children, one for herself, and then all three all over again. Different struggles, different stories, but a shared road through a loved world.
NO GOODBYES
Wes Mountain
Do we have a right to disappear? Is it possible anymore? Thanks to modern technology, D.I. Sarah Blakely has noted more and more appearances from cold case missing persons. But before she can find some connection, their bodies start washing up on beaches…
KITTISH BANTER
Calico M. Netwally
When Irsim finally gets away from their conservative Muslim parents, they’re hardly expecting to end up in Leeds’ gayest Muslim house-share. Soon enough, thanks to new friends and the landlord’s excitable daughter, they’re considering their relationship to religion altogether.
THE FROZENS
Lauren O’Farrell
Unaware that she’s only days away from a cancer diagnosis, Lauren saves a boy she sees lying on the railway tracks. Soon she meets her own Death, and they both embark on a wild journey towards loving life.
UNCLE C.O.
Judy Powell
Dawning with the 20th century, this hand-me-down story is told in the shadow of one mysterious larger- than-life relative. See ‘Uncle C.O.’ lead his family from obscurity in Ireland to prosperity in England – but he who giveth can taketh away…
TWINS
Teresa Robertson
In this memoir celebrating extended family life, the author loses her twin brother while weeks away from delivering her first child. How does one bridge the gap between death and life? How do lost things come together again?
IT ALL COMES TOGETHER, IT ALL FALLS APART
Richard Rudge
Growth and decay, creation and destruction, beginning and ending… This is a story of cycles, of how time turns, of how mistakes are made and learned from. What does it mean to live in a changing world, and to be part of its changes?
GROWING
Graham Samels, Maria Solecki, Jenny Turner
Right before Natasha’s 40th birthday, her perfect life collapses. Cheating partner, flaky friends – but, when she’s unexpectedly awarded an unwanted allotment, she discovers you don’t always need a perfect life to live a good life.
WOLF GIRL WICKED
Yanna Sapon
In her final year of school, Vivienne just wants to be invisible. One wrong move could capture the attention of Caoimhe, the sadistic queen bee who rules the student populace. But then Caoimhe’s behaviour starts changing… And there’s someone watching in the woods.
FALLING IN LOVE ON THE FAMILY COMPUTER
Lois de Silva
2008: on the adolescent internet, two likewise teenaged girls find each other from half the world away. But in this time when the digital and the physical are still kept at a distance, what does it mean to fall in love through a screen?
TURN OFF THE MACHINES
Joshua Sims
A small toy elephant whose trunk is stitched to his chest wakes up in an abandoned library in an abstract, crumbling world. His task is simple: turn off six mysterious, failing machines. Each machine, however, is fiercely defended by its caretaker…
I’LL BE FINE
Jeeti Singh
Trapped in a bathroom, hounded by her inner demons, a woman thinks back to the mother she lost to suicide years ago. So begins a life-spanning journey through time, from the history shared between mother and daughter and the future she faces without her.
SEA FRET
Savannah Storm
After graduating from university, Rina moves home to the Yorkshire coast, burned out and directionless. Inspired by some brave wintertime swimmers, she joins an unexpected community and discovers a new love of the freezing cold North Sea.
FOR SURVIVAL
Ella Stovell
Two isolated strangers meet in an Edinburgh graveyard on Halloween. One happens to be a vampire. They strike up an unlikely friendship, a much-needed level of vulnerability and connection. So, who else needs help in the city’s supernatural underbelly?
ANYWHERE
Qianyu Wang
When bands go on tour, they explore so many new places – and so do the fans that follow them. This is the personal account of one very devoted fan, a narrative of personal growth woven between more than 50 concerts across the UK.
DOES THAT MEAN I CAN DO ANYTHING
Qianyu Wang
After two years of uncertainty, a chance night at the theatre inspires the author to seek out an autism diagnosis. That leads to emails, phone calls, appointments, and waiting, and waiting, and waiting… And then, what next?
CARCINISATION
Jess Winton
A lone traveller journeys north searching for a hermit who can grant any wish. In exchange for four gifts, his wish is granted: he becomes a crab. But what are these four gifts, and what stories come with them?
LAPIN BLEU
Lottie Withers
In this memoir, for a child diagnosed with the rare genetic disorder 22q11 – A.K.A. DiGeorge Syndrome – her closest companion is the rabbit named Lapin Bleu. When her companion vanishes in the hospital, the loss takes its toll…
