Villard, First Second, Abrams Ink Book Deals
This story originally appeared in PW Comics Week on February 23, 2007 Sign up now!
by Calvin Reid, PW Comics Week -- Publishers Weekly, 2/23/2007
A number of acquisitions were announced during New York Comic-con.
Villard Grabs ASP's Mouse Guard; Out of Picture
Continuing to add to its graphic novel list, Random House imprint Villard has acquired the rights to two works originally published independently. Villard announced a deal with indie comics house Archaia Studios Press to acquire trade paperback rights to Dan Petersen's critically acclaimed fantasy series, Mouse Guard: Fall 1152. Villard has also acquired the rights to Out of Picture, volume 1, an anthology of full-color comics stories created by a variety of artists who generally work in animation.
Mouse Guard: Fall 1152 will collect the first six issues of the Mouse Guard series originally published in periodical format by Archaia Studios. Recommended for ages 10 and up, the full-color trade paper edition will be released in February 2008 and will include 12 pages of bonus material by Petersen.
Villard purchased world rights to the trade paperback edition in a deal negotiated by Archaia Studios. The series was acquired by Villard editor Tricia Narwani, who said, "Mouse Guard already looks and feels like a classic." Mouse Guard is an adventure fantasy series set in a fanciful medieval-like animal universe. Three elite mouse guards, Saxon, Kenzie and Lieam, are sent to find a missing mouse merchant and discover a plot to overthrow the mouse stronghold of Lockhaven.
Archaia Studios will publish a hardcover edition of Mouse Guard: Fall 1152 in April 2007. ASP will also continue to publish the next Mouse Guard periodical series, Winter 1152, beginning bimonthly in July 2007.
Villard editor Tim Mak acquired rights to Out of Picture. Originally released by French publisher Pacquet at last summer's MoCCA Art Fest in New York City, the book features short comics works by illustrators Daisuke Tsutsumi, Michael Knapp and Vincent Nguyen, among others. The deal is for world rights, excluding French, and was negotiated by agent Judy Hansen.
First Second Buys Comics How-to Title for Kids
First Second editorial director Mark Siegel has acquired Adventures in Cartooning: How to Turn Your Doodles into Comics by James Sturm, Alexis Frederick Frost and Andrew Arnold, a full-color how-to title for kids that's also a fantasy adventure story starring a brave knight, elves and a dragon. Sturm is a cofounder and director of the Center for Cartoon Studies in White River Junction, Vt., and Frost and Arnold were part of CCS's first graduating class. Siegel called it "the perfect first how-to cartoon book for young readers. A rollicking yarn that inspires as it instructs, and informs as it entertains." The deal was brokered by agent Judith Hansen.
Abrams Inks Deals on Comics History; Kirby Bio
Harry N. Abrams editor Charles Kochman has acquired rights to Wordless Books: The Original Graphic Novels by David A. Berona, a prose account of the wordless graphic novels created in the early part of the century and up to the 1950s by such artists as Frans Masereel, Lynd Ward, Otto Nuckel, William Gropper and Milt Gross. The 17,000-word manuscript features more than 200 illustrations and includes an introduction by comics artist Peter Kuper. The deal was negotiated by agent Judy Hansen.
In a deal already announced, Kochman has also acquired rights to Kirby: King of Comics, a coffee-table/biography of the comics master Jack Kirby by Mark Evanier, writer, comics expert and a former assistant and friend of Kirby's. The book will be published in October in full color. Evanier is also planning a second volume of the biography.
