Marvels: The Novelization - by Steve Darnall (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

For the first time, a novelization of Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross' bestselling and now classic miniseries from 1994--Marvels, offering an thrilling all-new interpretation of one of the most famous stories in Marvel Comics history.

Welcome to New York. Here, burning figures roam the streets, men in brightly colored costumes scale the glass and concrete walls, creatures from space threaten to devour our world . . . and everyone else is going about their lives.

This is the Marvel Universe, where the ordinary and fantastic interact daily. This is the world of Marvels--one of the most important and bestselling stories in Marvel Comics history, which Stan Lee described in his introduction to the first collected edition as "innovative, brilliantly conceived, and skillfully executed."

Over 30 years later, Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross' groundbreaking comic book series Marvels gets a long-awaited novelization by Steve Darnall, author of Uncle Sam and Ross's writing partner on the original proposal.

Marvels was a landmark series when it was first published--peeling back the curtain on Marvel's history. It's a story told from the perspective of an everyman character--news photographer Phil Sheldon--who chronicles a world full of costumed superhumans, providing an on-the-ground view of events in the Marvel Universe as they unfold. Darnall's prose perfectly captures the magic of Busiek and Ross' original story, offering insights and background previously untold in the comic book.

Tying the story together in a stunning package is an all-new painted cover, four all-new color illustrations, and four all-new black-and-white illustrations by Alex Ross, as well as an all-new afterword by Ross.

Review Quotes

"Marvels is a giant leap forward, bringing us to a new plateau in the evolution of illustrated literature . . . these tales are a glowing tribute to what has gone before, and an inspiring presage of what is yet to come. [Busiek and Ross] have taken comics to the next level of entertainment by adding a dimension and a reality that have seldom, if ever, been seen in the medium. I've read these stories over and over, each time finding something new and surprising."

"Marvels (the graphic novel) and Marvels (the novelization of the graphic novel) are both filled with people who do incredible things. I'm currently most impressed with the incredible thing Steve Darnall did, adapting the graphic novel into prose, keeping so much of the brilliance of Kurt Busiek's writing and Alex Ross' visual imagery. Each book is a must-have if you loved the other."

"There have been many milestones in the history of Marvel Comics, and I've been here for a few of them. Now all of you can be here to look back through these pages, and mark a new turning point. You can remember that you were there when Marvels came out."

"With the novelization of Marvels, Steve Darnall has pulled off something I would have thought impossible. He has made a coherent, fast-moving narrative out of the first forty years of the Marvel Comics Universe--and told the story in the voice of a non-super eyewitness, a New York newspaperman who gives us a human perspective on what it would be like to work and raise kids in a world filled with Avengers and X-Men. Marvels: The Novelization filters a modern mythology through the lens of a very mortal man. It is a mark of Darnall's skill that, in the end, we care more about Phil Sheldon and his family than we do about Spider-Man and the Hulk."

About the Author

Steve Darnall first worked with Alex Ross when the two collaborated on a Human Torch story that served as the inspiration for the award-winning 1993 series Marvels. The two later worked together as writer and artist on the graphic novel Uncle Sam and the 2020 anthology Marvel. Darnall also served as a consultant on the movie Being the Ricardos and Ken Burns's documentary Country Music. He is the editor of Nostalgia Digest magazine and the host of two weekly radio shows dedicated to the golden age of radio. Alex Ross studied illustration at the American Academy of Art in Chicago, then honed his craft as a storyboard artist before entering the field of comics. His groundbreaking miniseries Marvels created a wider acceptance for painted comics. In 1996, he moved on to produce the equally successful Kingdom Come for DC Comics. At Abrams ComicArts, Ross is also the writer and artist of Fantastic Four: Full Circle (the award-winning national bestseller), The Alex Ross Marvel Comics Poster Book, The Alex Ross Marvel Comics Super Villains Poster Book, and Uncle Sam: Special Election Edition.