Every year, the Canadian Children’s Book Centre celebrates the best work by Canadian creators with the CCBC Book Awards. The winners were announced this week and we’re thrilled to congratulate the Fan Brothers, whose beautiful book, The Barnabus Project, won the TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award!
The Barnabus Project
By The Fan Brothers
72 Pages | Ages 5-9 | Hardcover
ISBN 9780735263260 | Tundra Books
Deep underground beneath Perfect Pets, where children can buy genetically engineered “perfect” creatures, there is a secret lab. Barnabus and his friends live in this lab, but none of them is perfect. They are all Failed Projects. Barnabus has never been outside his tiny bell jar, yet he dreams of one day seeing the world above ground that his pal Pip the cockroach has told him about: a world with green hills and trees, and buildings that reach all the way to the sky, lit with their own stars. But Barnabus may have to reach the outside world sooner than he thought, because the Green Rubber Suits are about to recycle all Failed Projects . . . and Barnabus doesn’t want to be made into a fluffier pet with bigger eyes. He just wants to be himself. So he decides it’s time for he and the others to escape. With his little trunk and a lot of cooperation and courage, Barnabus sets out to find freedom – and a place where he and his friends can finally be accepted for who they are. This suspenseful, poignant and magical story about following your dreams and finding where you truly belong will draw readers into a surreal, lushly detailed world in which perfection really means being true to yourself and your friends.
“The Fan Brothers have created a uniquely charming story filled with fantasy, adventure and heart . . . With illustrations that are detailed, precise and perfect, this exquisite collaboration uses simple, spare and understated text to tell a poignant and powerful story about self-acceptance and accepting one’s flaws and differences . . . This is an instant classic that is sure to delight readers of all ages for many years to come.” – Jury members Lisa Doucet, Colette Poitras, and Joel Sutherland.