The Official First Day Cover features a stamp celebrating the award-winning graphic novel This One Summer, by Jillian Tamaki and Mariko Tamaki.

One of four stamps in the Graphic Novelists 2024 set, the stamp is cancelled in Toronto, Ontario – Jillian’s long-time place of residence and Mariko’s birthplace.

Good to know

The Graphic Novelists issue celebrates the work of some of Canada’s most talented and influential graphic novelists:

Chester Brown: Louis Riel: A Comic-Strip Biography
Michel Rabagliati: Paul à Québec
Seth: Clyde Fans
Mariko Tamaki, Jillian Tamaki: This One Summer

The four stamps highlight acclaimed novels by each author, who created original illustrations for their stamp designs that show the main characters engrossed in their own stories.

About the Graphic Novelists issue

Among Canada’s most talented and influential graphic novelists, Chester Brown, Michel Rabagliati, Seth, and Jillian Tamaki and Mariko Tamaki deftly interweave words and illustrations in their award-winning works.

These stamps – featuring an acclaimed novel by each author – show the main characters engrossed in their own stories through original illustrations created by the novelists themselves.

About Jillian Tamaki and Mariko Tamaki

Critically acclaimed for their individual and collaborative creations, cousins Jillian Tamaki (b. 1980 in Ottawa, Ontario) and Mariko Tamaki (b. 1975 in Toronto, Ontario) share a talent for nuance. Jillian’s skillful illustrations have appeared in everything from books and webcomics to animated television, while Mariko’s witty and insightful words have lent themselves to dozens of novels, short essays and comic books. This One Summer (2014) is the second prize-winning graphic novel that they co-created. The poignant tale of cottage friends Rose and Windy stumbling from innocence into adolescence, it was the first graphic novel to receive a Caldecott Honor (U.S.), which is awarded to the most distinguished children’s picture books.

About the design

The front of the Official First Day Cover features a photograph of the cover of This One Summer, which shows two young girls jumping into a lake. The background of the envelope shows sand and a beach towel.

The front also includes the text “Graphic Novelists” and the Jillian Tamaki and Mariko Tamaki stamp, cancelled in Toronto, Ontario – Jillian’s long-time place of residence and Mariko’s birthplace.

The stamp is an original drawing by Jillian Tamaki of Rose and Windy – the two young girls who are the main characters in the novel – reading their own story. The cancel image is of an open graphic novel.

The back features a photograph of a page from the novel, along with a short text on the Tamakis and This One Summer.

The stamp was cancelled on May 10, in advance of the Toronto Comic Arts Festival (May 11-12).

Product # 414235131

Graphic Novelists – Jillian Tamaki and Mariko Tamaki: Official First Day Cover