Marvel Comics

“Sean Howe’s history of Marvel makes a compulsively readable, riotous and heartbreaking version of my favorite story, that of how a bunch of weirdoes changed the world…That it’s all true is just frosting on the cake.” -Jonathan Lethem “Exhaustively researched and artfully assembled, this book is a historical exploration, a labor of love, and a living illustration of how the weirdest corners of the counterculture can sometimes become the culture-at-large.” – Chuck Klosterman In the early 1960s, Marvel Comics introduced a series of bright-costumed superhero characters-including Iron Man, the Hulk, Thor, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, Daredevil, and the Amazing Spider-Man-that would evolve into a modern American mythology for millions of readers. Over the last half-century, these characters have been passed along among generations of brilliant editors, artists, and writers who struggled with commercial mandates, a fickle audience, and, over matters of credit and control, one another.
Written by Sean Howe, former comic book reviewer and editor at Entertainment Weekly, Marvel Comics: The Untold Story is a gripping narrative of one of the most extraordinary, beloved, and beleaguered pop cultural entities in America’s history.

Author Biography

Sean Howe’s writing has appeared in The Los Angeles Times, The New York Observer, Spin, and The Village Voice. He is a former comic book reviewer and editor at Entertainment Weekly. He is the editor of Give Our Regards to the Atomsmashers!: Writers on Comics (Pantheon, 2004) which included contributions from Jonathan Lethem, Luc Sante, and Lydia Millet, among others. He lives in Brooklyn.