Damian Alexander Sells Rights To His New “Pen Pals” Graphic Novel

Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Agent, Damian Alexander, graphic novel, Pen Pals

Damian Alexander Sells Rights To His New “Pen Pals” Graphic Novel

Damian Alexander Sells Rights To His New “Pen Pals” Graphic Novel to Graphic Universe to be published in 2029

Article Summary

• Damian Alexander sold rights to his new middle-grade graphic novel Pen Pals to Graphic Universe for winter 2029.
• Pen Pals follows two boys whose summer meeting leads to a long-distance friendship and powerful self-discovery.
• Elizabeth Bennett at Transatlantic Agency handled the world rights deal, with Sean Tulien acquiring for Graphic Universe.
• Damian Alexander builds on Absolutely Everything, Hand-Me-Down, and Other Boys with the new Pen Pals graphic novel.

Comic book creator Damian Alexander has sold the publishing rights to his new middle-grade graphic novel, Pen Pals, to Sean Tulien at Graphic Universe for the winter of 2029. Pen Pals is about two boys who meet on a summer vacation and start a long-distance correspondence that turns into friendship and self-discovery. Damien Alexander’s agent, Elizabeth Bennett at Transatlantic Agency, sold world rights.

Damian Alexander’s previous book for Graphic Universe, Absolutely Everything, was published last year, a 216-page story about sixth grader Marcella, undiagnosed ADHD, friendship drift, and a family move, drawn from Alexander’s own late diagnosis while he was working on his debut. He also just published Hand-Me-Down: A Graphic Memoir from First Second in July this year, as a schoolboy imagining what life was like when his mother and grandmother were middle schoolers like him.

Before both came Other Boys from First Second in 2021, the graphic memoir that first put him on library lists. A viral Tumblr strip about looking up to Matildaand Kiki’s Delivery Service instead of boy heroes grew into a starred Kirkus and Booklist book about bullying, grief, a vow of silence in seventh grade, and coming out mostly to himself. It landed on ALA’s Great Graphic Novels for Teens and Rainbow Book List.

Alexander is a Simmons MFA in Writing for Children, a Lambda Literary Fellow, and a John Locher Memorial Award winner. He grew up around Boston and lives in New England. Graphic Universe launched in 2006 as Lerner’s home for graphic novels aimed at developing readers. Tulien, now editorial director, is a Minneapolis writer-editor with a long résumé at Capstone and Lerner in visual kidlit. Elizabeth Bennett, a Transatlantic partner based in Boston, came out of Scholastic Press, Reader’s Digest, and HMH, and probably her name forced her into this field, right?

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