 The store was visited by journalist Noah Richler in 2009, who called it "one of the craziest, most amusing and well-ordered second-hand bookstores I have ever frequented".Aqua Books sponsors the Aqua Books Lansdowne Prize for Poetry, which is awarded annually to the best full length adult book of poetry in either French or English by a resident of Manitoba, Canada.The Aqua Books Lansdowne Prize for Poetry Reading Series, hosted in conjunction with The Writers' Collective, is based around this award.