Spider-Man YA Novel Swings Into Action Next Month

I just found out something really cool. The Disney-owned Hyperion imprint is publishing a new young adult novel about the newest (and I'd say the best) Spider-Man, Miles Morales. Even better, it's being written by Jason Reynolds, a talented Black author. Reynolds is no stranger to quality storytelling, either-- last year his book "As Brave As You" won the Kirkus Prize last year and he's a previous winner of the Coretta Scott-King Award.

Seriously. This is a book you want to read. Pre-order it at your local indie bookstore or at Amazon. Request it at your local library. Get it in the hands of a teen you know. I got an advance reader copy and was blown away.

Reynolds' Spider-Man novel deals head-on with issues of race and class in Brooklyn, being a young biracial kid on scholarship, and how these influences shape his life as he also struggles to be a superhero. Even more so than in the comics, Miles Morales' Puerto Rican and Black backgrounds are implicitly referenced in the text and made important. It examines not just what being Miles Morales means for Spider-Man, but what being Spider-Man means for Miles Morales. It's been getting rave review from everyone from Kirkus Book Reviews to the co-creator of Miles Morales himself, Brian Michael Bendis.

Listen Up: MEGASheen

MEGASheen is hosted by Nick and Viktor, with a focus on queer people of color that identify as geeks or nerds. Nick is a passionate video game and 80s cartoon fan, while Viktor's wheelhouse is comics (he's a graphic novel creator himself as the creative mind between the amazing urban fantasy StrangeLore) politics and pop culture.

MEGASheen has a website, and you can follow the podcast via iTunes on iOS or via soundcloud .  They're on a 3 week hiatus right now, so this is the perfect time to catch up!

Listen Up is an ongoing series devoted to shining a spotlight on podcasts by diverse creators. You can check out all the podcasts previously featured here. If you have a podcast you'd like to recommend, post it in the comments or email me at shawnstruck at gmail dot com.

Listen Up: Nerds of Prey

I first heard of the Nerds of Prey podcast during their guest-host stint on an episode of the Food Fight podcast. The Nerds of Prey podcast debuted earlier this year, and hosts Shannon, CG, Lauren, and Mel already have a great rapport with one another. Four Black nerd women hold court of everything in the geek galaxy- movies, comics, television and gaming. They've managed to score some impressive interviews too, like Executive Producer of Lost, Alias and Fringe Monica Owusu-Breen.

Follow along via the Nerds of Prey Podcast website, via iTunes on iOS or soundcloud.

Listen Up is an ongoing series devoted to shining a spotlight on podcasts by diverse creators. You can check out all the podcasts previously featured here. If you have a podcast you'd like to recommend, post it in the comments or email me at shawnstruck at gmail dot com.

Super Powers, Super Mom: Raising Dion Now Online

Description: A young black boy faces the camera, giggling. He closes his
eyes, then disappears with a puff of black smoke. He reappears on the other
side of the room, suddenly reappearing in front of his mother, who drops the
bag of groceries she was holding in surprise.

Many young children dream of having super powers. Many people compare parents to super heroes. So what do you do when you have to raise a child who has all the normal evergy and curiosity and fears of any other... but also a bevy of barely-controlled super powers? These issues and more are being tackled in xxxx xxxxx 's new comic book series, Raising Dion.

Raising Dion offers a novel way to look at so many issues and ideas: super humans in society, superpowers and how they affect relationships, the challenges of parenting, and race in American society.

In particular, Dion's mother tells him not to use not use any of his super powers in public addresses how society implicitly judges his as a black child and explicitly how he is judged as a super human in a comic book world. It also echoes "The Talk" that parents of color have to have with thier kids about encounters with the police. As Raising Dion's artist Jason Piperberg says in an interview at Fusion.net:

“Traditionally in comics and really most stories, the protagonist is the one with the powers,” said Piperberg. “You see the world through the eyes of the character with all the abilities usually because they are immediately the most exciting and/or interesting person in the story.” 

... “I think a lot of people still don’t get that The Talk is a real thing that black families have to have,” said Piperberg. He admitted that initially the parallels weren’t all that clear to him either. “I think it’s really important to step out of my bubble of privilege to see what’s really going on. To discover and look at injustices that have been swept under the rug, or worse, accepted as the norm by society.”

The first issue of Raising Dion is available online to read for free.

Best Possible Version of Young Justice Released

Young Justice was a series that was canceled despite good ratings and a large fan base and is a prime example of a great series cancelled way too soon. There were a few DVDs released, but they were released across 4 bare-bones DVDs and DVD set in a confusing manner. Now Young Justice fans get some entertainment justice The complete first season of Young Justice was released on Blu-ray yesterday!

No word on a second season yet, but word is that strong sales of this DVD will send a strong case for releasing the rest of the series in a similar fashion.

Meet Your New Favorite Superhero, Spark

Ted Anderson and Alex Law, the team behind the awesome blog "Little Girls Are Better At Designing Superheroes Than You", have teamed up again to bring another awesome superhero to life: Sparks, the secret identity of 9 year old Lucia Marquez-Miller. She's a budding engineer with telekinetic powers that she calls her "spark".

Her creators are making an open pitch to gauge interest. If there's enough interest, the want to make the comic on ongoing, published series. Here's the pitch:

As Spark, the world’s youngest superhero, she’s a junior member of a superhero team while also trying to live a normal life. Can Lucia juggle her friends and family while also saving the world from super villains? We’re posting a 15-page standalone comic here to give readers an idea of what the book would be like.

Take a gander:




Want to see the rest? It's available in full size here.

Ultimate Team Up: Newlyweds Throw Superman & Wonder Woman Themed Wedding

Photo via your az photog

The groom said that the bride has been "...Wonder Woman from the moment we met, and I found out everything she’s been through and accomplished. She has always said I came in like Superman and changed her life.”

The article is short, but a picture's worth a thousand words, so check out the compilation of pictures from the wedding and read the thoughts of the happy couple in their own words here.

Historic 6th Reprint of New Ms. Marvel Is Great News For Diversity In Comics

Kamala Khan is a daring and cheerful 16 year old Pakistani-American girl. She's also the secret identity of the super-heroine Ms. Marvel, stepping into the boots of a legacy hero in her own solo title in February of this year to critical acclaim. In addition to fighting crime and taking on super-powered super villains, the comic also explores how she deals with a new ability to shapeshift, and how it's not just a strong power to have as a superhero, but also as a way to confront battling what it means to be a Muslim teen growing up in New Jersey.

It turns out that the Ms. Marvel run has also been a runaway commercial success as well, in a way that few other titles have. MS. Marvel is getting a sixth printing. The Daily Dot puts that in perspective:

Sixth printings are major milestones in the world of comics. Spider-Man Issue #583, the one with President Obama on the cover, only made it to a fifth printing despite making international headlines. Kamala now joins an elite lineup of bestselling comics that have performed beyond all expectations. Many of these titles are genre classics and major issues in their respective franchises, including a number of prestigious Marvel titles ...That Ms Marvel is getting a sixth printing speaks to the increasing diversity of comics fandom as well as the growing number of women and supporters of multi-cultural storylines who are entering the fold.