Introducing Graphic Novels
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62 Graphic Novels
What comes to mind when you think about graphic novels? You might think of comics such as the Beano, or of the popular manga books from Japan. Graphic novels mix words and pictures to tell a story. They can be dramatic, sad, funny or scary! In this booklet, we’ve brought together examples of some very different graphic novels. Each of them uses brilliant illustration and clever text to bring the story to life. We think they’re all great and hope you will too! Along with the extracts there are some interviews with the authors and illustrators to give you an insight into their world!
Contents Fish-Head Steve! by Jamie Smart 3
Smile by Raina Telgemeier 6
Stormbreaker: The Graphic Novel by Anthony Horowitz, Antony Johnston, Kanako & Yuzuru 10
Manga Shakespeare: The Tempest by Paul Duffield 16
Outlaw: The Legend of Robin Hood by Tony Lee, Sam Hart and Artur Fujita 21
Amulet: The Stonekeeper by Kazu Kibuishi 26
2 Fish-Head Steve!
About Jamie Smart (author and illustrator) Jamie Smart’s characters Space Raoul, My Own Genie, Count Von Poo and Fish-Head Steve have all found homes in the pages of The Sunday Times, The Dandy, Toxic comic and The DFC. Jamie is also the current writer and artist of Desperate Dan in The Dandy. He worked closely with Cartoon Network for six years, along with a more recent stint at Disney doing character design.
How did you get into graphic novels? What’s your favourite graphic novel? I’ve been drawing comics and cartoons for I think Jeff Smith’s BONE always comes to as long as I can remember. I went to art mind. It really does stand out as the perfect college and from there began to find work example of combining storytelling and art, doing illustrations for magazines, but in my and is just a fantastic adventure to read! spare time I was always drawing comics, as I found telling stories with cartoons much more What would be your super power? exciting than just drawing one-off pictures. I’d be able to fly! Even though I’m rather afraid I sent what I’d drawn off to everyone I could of heights, which might be a problem. Either think of; newspapers, publishers, trying to find that or I’d be able to make cheese and biscuits someone to print them. It took a while, but appear out of nowhere. now I draw comic books and graphic novels for a living, and there’s no better job in the Tell us a secret? world! I can make cheese and biscuits appear out of Did you read graphic novels when you were nowhere! in Year 7? I don’t think I did, and I really regret that. I read a lot of comics when I was younger, and then rediscovered them when I went to college, but in between I think I got distracted away. Which is a real shame, I missed a great many comic titles I wish I’d read at the time, there’s a big gap in my comic knowledge because of it!
3 Steve has woken up to find that something about himself has changed, he just can’t work out what it is...
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5 4 4 Extract from Fish-Head Steve!,© Jamie Smart, 2010 Reproduced by permission of The Random House Group, David Fickling Books, 31 Beaumont Street, Oxford, OX1 2NP. www.davidficklingbooks.com ISBN 978-1-849-92173-2 5 5 Smile is the true story of Raina’s move from middle school to high school, losing her front teeth and Smile gaining new friends along the way.
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8 Extract from Smile, © Raina Telgemeier, 2010 194 Published by Graphix, an imprint of Scholastic 195Inc. Reproduced by permission of Scholastic Inc., 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012. www.scholastic.com ISBN 978-0-545-13206-0 9 Stormbreaker: The Graphic Novel
About Anthony Horowitz (author) Anthony Horowitz is an award-winning children’s author, writer for television and creator of the phenomenal bestselling Alex Rider and The Power of Five series as well as the Diamond Brothers detective books – all published by Walker Books. He is also the author of The House of Silk: The New Sherlock Holmes. He lives in central London.
About Antony Johnston (author) Antony Johnston has been writing comics and graphic novels since the 1990s, from superhero stories such as Daredevil and Wolverine, to science fiction adventures includingWasteland and Dead Space, and even thrillers like The Coldest City and Julius. He also writes videogames, including many in the Dead Space series, and other games like Binary Domain. Antony lives in north-west England with his partner Marcia, his dogs Connor and Rosie, and too many gadgets.
How did you get into graphic novels? What’s your favourite graphic novel? My dad read comics to me when I was a child, If I’m allowed to pick a series, I’d have to say so when I learned to read myself I devoured Sandman, which is about ten books long, but comics as well as books. I was very lucky, really worth it. It’s a sort of modern fantasy epic because my parents encouraged me to read about the Lord of Dreams, who just happens to anything I could get my hands on - so I did! As I be a big mopey old goth. grew up, the sort of comics I read changed and grew with me, and then when I was a teenager Tell us a secret? the ‘graphic novel boom’ began. So really, I’ve I’m a big mopey old goth. That might explain a lot. been reading them my whole life. What would be your fancy dress costume of What would be your super power? choice? What I’d like is the power to stop time for a while, Because I’m lazy, I’d go as a Heavy Metal Rock so I can get more work done. There never seem Singer. All I’d have to do is dig my old clothes to be enough hours in a day to fit in everything from when I was a teenager out from the back I want to do. But knowing my luck, what I’d of the wardrobe, and hope they still fit me. Oh, probably get is bitten by a radioactive keyboard. I suppose I’d need a wig as well. All my hair fell This would enable me to type really really fast, out years ago! but also force me to get more work done without being able to stop time. Which is nowhere near as cool.
About Kanako and Yuzuru (illustrators) Two sisters from Japan, who collaborate to produce manga-style art for comics and graphic novels. Yuzuru is an illustrator and lives in Tokyo; Kanako is a graphic designer and lives in London.
10 Alex Rider has been forcibly recruited into MI6 after the mysterious death of his guardian... within days he’s gone from schoolboy to superspy!
11 12 13 14 Extract from STORMBREAKER™: THE GRAPHIC NOVEL based on the screenplay by Anthony Horowitz; adapted by Antony Johnston; illustrated by Kanako and Yuzuru Text & illustrations © 2006 Walker Books Ltd. Screenplay © MMVI Samuelsons / IoM Film. Film © MMVI Film & Entertainment VIP Medienfonds 4 GmbH & Co. KG. Style Guide © MMVI ARR Ltd Trademarks 2006 Samuelson Productions Ltd. StormbreakerTM, Alex RiderTM, Boy with torch LogoTM, AR LogoTM Reproduced by permission of Walker Books Ltd, London SE11 5HJ. www.walker.co.uk ISBN 978-1-84428-111-4 15 Manga Shakespeare: The Tempest
About Paul Duffield (illustrator) Paul Duffield is an illustrator and animator who takes influence from a fusion of manga and European comics. After graduating with a BA in animation at Kingston, he went on to win both Tokyopop’s Rising Stars of Manga, and the International Manga and Anime Festival grand prizes.
How did you get into graphic novels? What’s your favourite graphic novel? My dad always used to buy me comics It’s hard to say! I like so many. Perhaps one of when I was little. As I got older, I started my favourites at the moment is Hilda and the reading manga and western graphic novels, Midnight Giant by Luke Pearson, although I and that’s when I started wanting to draw also like Mo-Bot High by Neill Cameron! them myself! Professionally speaking, my first big break was entering and winning Tell us a secret? the Rising Stars of Manga competition run I once got 1 out of 10 in a spelling test at by a company called Tokyopop. After that, school, and now I help edit and check the SelfMadeHero (the publisher of Manga spellings on a weekly comic. Shakespeare) approached me about the possibility of working on The Tempest, and What would be your fancy dress costume of that’s where my career really started! choice? Did you read graphic novels when you were A Viking. Definitely a Viking – preferably with in Year 7? a horned helmet. I did! My dad had a collection of comics published by Vertigo that I read (intended for a much older audience than I was at the time), and I also read any manga I could get my hands on - although there wasn’t a whole lot that had been translated to English at the time.
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This cutting edge adaptation of a Shakespeare play is set in the future, when an energy crisis has plunged the earth into a second Dark Age.
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Extract from Manga Shakespeare, The Tempest, © 2007, SELFMADEHERO Reproduced by permission of SELFMADEHERO, Metro Media Ltd, 5 Upper Wimpole Street, London, W1G 6BP. www.selfmadehero.com ISBN 978-0-9552856-2-2 20 TEMPEST_spreads_AW_Layout 1 16/01/2014 12:23 Page 39 Outlaw: The Legend of Robin Hood
About Tony Lee (author) A number 1 New York Times bestselling author, Tony has recently completed a 12 part Doctor Who series entitled The Eleventh Doctor. His series of Sherlock Holmes, Robin Hood and Excalibur graphic novels have received world wide praise.
How did you get into graphic novels? What’s your favourite graphic novel? I wanted to write comics, and graphic Laika, by Nick Abadzis. It’s about the novels are a longer form of comic, one first ever dog in space. It’s very well put that gives the writer more space to tell the together and you really find yourself story, I liked the extra space that it gave feeling for the people and animals me, and never looked back! involved, happiness, anger, sadness... It’s Did you read graphic novels when you a true story that happened over fifty years were in Year 7? ago now, but it actually makes you feel raw all over again for reading it. Absolutely I did, I found that as a kid they were easier amazing. for me to read than a normal book, mainly as I was impatient and wanted to get to Tell us a secret? the action first. Reading graphic novels No matter how I seem on stage during my and comics actually helped me get back talks, I’m actually quite shy and always into reading other books, as I started to worried that one day someone will tell me enjoy the journey that they told rather than I’m no good as a writer and my adventure the destination. will be over.
About Sam Hart (illustrator) A comic book, magazine and storyboard illustrator. Born in England, he lives, works and teaches comic art in Brazil. He has worked on Starship Troopers, Judge Dredd, Outlaw: The Legend of Robin Hood and Excalibur: The Legend of King Arthur.
How did you get into graphic novels? Did you read graphic novels when you I started reading The Beano, Dandy, were in Year 7? Superman comics and Raymond Briggs’ I was lucky that a lot of really good children’s books (we didn’t call them superhero graphic novels were coming graphic novels at the time) when I was out at that time: Dark Knight Returns, The five, and by the time I was six I was set Killing Joke, Watchmen. And also some on drawing comics and graphic novels more political and personal stories, such for a living. In 2004 I met Tony Lee and as V for Vendetta, Love and Rockets, and we started working together on Starship Maus. Troopers, then Robin Hood and King Tell us a secret? Arthur. No, because then it wouldn’t be a secret. Well, okay… Drawing is a little like magic; 39 you make people believe that something made of paper and ink is a real thing.
21 In this scene Robin comes face to face with the Sheriff of Nottingham, and meets Maid Marian for the very first time...
22 23 24 Text © 2009 Tony Lee Illustrations © 2009 Sam Hart Colourist: Artur Fujita. From OUTLAW: THE LEGEND OF ROBIN HOOD by Tony Lee, Sam Hart & Artur Fujita. Reproduced by permission of Walker Books Ltd, London SE11 5HJ www.walker.co.uk 25 Emily and Navin’s mum has been Amulet: The kidnapped by a huge tentacled creature. Emily must decide whether to listen to Stonekeeper the mysterious voice from the amulet.
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30 Extract from Amulet, Book One, The Stonekeeper, © Kazu Kibuishi, 2008 Published by Graphix, an imprint of Scholastic67 Inc. 66 Reproduced by permission of Scholastic Inc., 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012. www.scholastic.com ISBN 978-0-439-84681-3 31 Book One The Stonekeeper
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