AWM Staff Picks: July 2024

Daredevil: Vol. 1 by Frank Miller and Klaus Janson

From the publisher: “Frank Miller helped redefine sequential storytelling in the early 1980s. His style, influenced by Will Eisner’s The Spirit, was new and exciting. One of his earliest issues featured the introduction of Elektra and was the first issue Miller wrote…Frank Miller’s Daredevil not only ranks as one of the classic comics of its era, and is a precursor to Miller’s Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Batman: Year One, Ronin, and Sin City.”

—Cassidy, Guest Services & Operations Supervisor

Doom Patrol Omnibus by Rachel Pollack

From the publisher: “In 1993, writer Rachel Pollack took over Doom Patrol from Grant Morrison, and quickly made the title her own—retaining its offbeat spirit while pushing its characters in new directions, and tackling important social issues in the Doom Patrol’s thoroughly unconventional way. This hardcover omnibus is the first-ever collection of Pollack’s run on Doom Patrol.“

I recently read this omnibus in preparation for a podcast interview about Pollack and loved every panel of it. Then, I had the honor of interviewing Joe Corallo, Neil Gaiman, and Mary K. Greer about Pollack’s writing and legacy. You can listen to this episode of Nation of Writers here.

—Nate, Digital Content Associate

Godly Heathens by H.E. Edgmon

From the publisher: “Godly Heathens is the first book in H.E. Edgmon’s YA contemporary fantasy duology The Ouroboros, in which a teen, Gem, finds out they’re a reincarnated god from another world…When Gem is attacked by a stranger claiming to be the Goddess of Death, Willa Mae saves their life and finally offers some answers. She and Gem are reincarnated gods who’ve known and loved each other across lifetimes. But Gem—or at least who Gem used to be—hasn’t always been the most benevolent deity. They’ve made a lot of enemies in the pantheon—enemies who, like the Goddess of Death, will keep coming. It’s a good thing they’ve still got Enzo. But as worlds collide and the past catches up with the present, Gem will discover that everyone has something to hide.”

—Noelle, Education Program Coordinator

Good One: A Show About Jokes

This is a documentary featuring comedian Mike Birbiglia and based on his podcast of a similar name and which I have previously recommended in a prior month. While the podcast focuses on other comedians’ joke writing, what makes this doc outstanding is the behind the scenes look at Mike’s writing process and how he carefully crafts his jokes and sets. I was taken aback by the number of other comedians that have adopted some of Mike’s techniques into their own routine, like his use of notecards to outline his shows and jokes. For fans of writing and comedy, this is a good one.

—Christopher, Director of Operations

Hild by Nicola Griffith

From the publisher: “A brilliant, lush, sweeping historical novel about the rise of the most powerful woman of the Middle Ages: Saint Hilda of Whitby…But now she has only the powerful curiosity of a bright child, a will of adamant, and a way of seeing the world that can seem uncanny, even supernatural, to those around her. Her uncle plots to become overking, ruthlessly using every tool at his disposal: blood, bribery, belief. Hild establishes a place for herself at his side as the king’s seer. And she is indispensable—unless she should ever lead the king astray…Hild is a young woman at the heart of the violence, subtlety, and mysticism of the early Middle Ages—all of it brilliantly and accurately evoked by Nicola Griffith’s luminous prose. Working from what little historical record is extant, Griffith has brought a beautiful, brutal world to vivid, absorbing life.”

—Allison, Program Director

The Many Deaths of Laila Starr by Ram V, illustrated by Filipe Andrade

From the publisher: “Humanity is on the verge of discovering immortality. As a result, the avatar of Death is cast down to Earth to live a mortal life in Mumbai as twenty-something Laila Starr. Struggling with her newfound mortality, Laila has found a way to be placed in the time and place where the creator of immortality will be born. Will Laila take her chance to stop mankind from permanently altering the cycle of life, or will death really become a thing of the past? A powerful new graphic novel from award-winning writer Ram V (These Savage Shores, Swamp Thing) and Filipe Andrade (Captain Marvel) that explores the fine line between living and dying through the lens of magical realism.”

—Matt, Community Engagement Manager

Marie Antionette by David Adjmi

From the publisher: “How’s a queen to keep her head in the middle of a revolution? Marie Antoinette delights and inspires her French subjects with her three-foot tall wigs and extravagant haute couture. But times change and even the most fashionable queens go out of style. In the humorous and haunting Marie Antoinette idle gossip turns more insidious as the country revolts demanding liberté égalité fraternité!”

—Matt, Community Engagement Manager

The Material by Camille Bordas

From the publisher: “Can comedy be taught? Someone, at some point, seemed to think so. The Chicago Stand-Up MFA program has enrolled young comedians for nearly a decade…Artie may be too handsome for standup, Olivia too reluctant to examine her own life, and Phil too afraid to cause harm. Kruger may be too vanilla to command his students’ respect, Ashbee too detached. And then we have Dorothy—the only woman on the program’s faculty—who though preparing to launch a comeback tour can’t tell if she’s too abiding, too ambitious, or too ambivalent…Riffing keenly across a diverse array of precision-cut perspectives, The Material examines life through the eyes of a reluctantly assembled ensemble, a band of outsiders bound together by the need to laugh and the longing to make others laugh even harder.”

—Maya, Marketing & Creative Associate

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt

From the publisher: “Shots rang out in Savannah’s grandest mansion in the misty, early morning hours of May 2, 1981. Was it murder or self-defense? For nearly a decade, the shooting and its aftermath reverberated throughout this hauntingly beautiful city of moss-hung oaks and shaded squares. John Berendt’s sharply observed, suspenseful, and witty narrative reads like a thoroughly engrossing novel, and yet it is a work of nonfiction. Berendt skillfully interweaves a hugely entertaining first-person account of life in this isolated remnant of the Old South with the unpredictable twists and turns of a landmark murder case.”

And now it will be a musical! We recently hosted John Berendt and Taylor Mac, who adapted the book for the stage, at the American Writers Museum, where they discussed their crafts and how the adaptation came to be. We recorded this conversation and you can listen to it here on AWM Author Talks.

—Nate, Digital Content Associate

Nina: A Story of Nina Simone by Traci N. Todd, illustrated by Christian Robinson

From the publisher: “Born Eunice Kathleen Waymon in small town North Carolina, Nina Simone was a musical child. She sang before she talked and learned to play piano at a very young age. With the support of her family and community, she received music lessons that introduced her to classical composers like Bach who remained with her and influenced her music throughout her life. She loved the way his music began softly and then tumbled to thunder, like her mother’s preaching, and in much the same way as her career. During her first performances under the name of Nina Simone her voice was rich and sweet but as the Civil Rights Movement gained steam, Nina’s voice soon became a thunderous roar as she raised her voice in powerful protest in the fight against racial inequality and discrimination.”

—Noelle, Education Program Coordinator

Red Dead Redemption II by Rockstar Games

It is an amazingly detailed game with a very compelling story that engages the player. Our exhibit Level Up: Writers & Gamers really makes me think of how much I like the game even if I’m just out riding my horse at sunset.

—Christopher, Director of Operations

A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki

From the publisher: “In Tokyo, sixteen-year-old Nao has decided there’s only one escape from her aching loneliness and her classmates’ bullying. But before she ends it all, Nao first plans to document the life of her great grandmother, a Buddhist nun who’s lived more than a century. A diary is Nao’s only solace—and will touch lives in ways she can scarcely imagine. Across the Pacific, we meet Ruth, a novelist living on a remote island who discovers a collection of artifacts washed ashore in a Hello Kitty lunchbox—possibly debris from the devastating 2011 tsunami. As the mystery of its contents unfolds, Ruth is pulled into the past, into Nao’s drama and her unknown fate, and forward into her own future. Full of Ozeki’s signature humor and deeply engaged with the relationship between writer and reader, past and present, fact and fiction, quantum physics, history, and myth, A Tale for the Time Being is a brilliantly inventive, beguiling story of our shared humanity and the search for home.”

—Maya, Marketing & Creative Associate

Very Important People

From the network: “Comedians are given makeovers to be transformed into someone completely new, and then have a fully-improvised interview with host Vic Michaelis.”

—Matt, Community Engagement Manager

What to the Slave is the Fourth of July? by Frederick Douglass

From the publisher: “In this famous speech, published widely in pamphlet form after it was given to a meeting of the Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery Society on July 5th, 1852, Douglass exposes the hypocrisy of America’s claim to Christian and democratic ideals in spite of its legacy of enslavement…’What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us?…What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim.'”

—Nate, Digital Content Associate