The Eisner Awards will soon be upon us, July is just around the corner. Today I thought reviewing the “Best Writer” category would be interesting. later in the week I will be posting a similar article on the category of “Best Writer/Artist”. So If you liked this post please check back soon.
Joe Hill, Locke & Key (IDW)
Hill is the second child of authors Stephen and Tabitha King. He grew up in Bangor, Maine. His younger brother Owen is also a writer. Hill has three sons.
Hill chose to use an abbreviated form of his given name (a reference to executed labor leader Joe Hill, for whom he was named) in 1997, out of a desire to succeed based solely on his own merits rather than as the son of Stephen King. After achieving a degree of independent success, Hill publicly confirmed his identity in 2007 after an article the previous year in Variety broke his cover (although online speculation about Hill’s family background had been appearing since 2005).
Joe Hill is a past recipient of the Ray Bradbury Fellowship. He has also received the William L. Crawford award for best new fantasy writer in 2006, the A. E. Coppard Long Fiction Prize in 1999 for “Better Than Home” and the 2006 World Fantasy Award for Best Novella for “Voluntary Committal”. His stories have appeared in a variety of magazines, such as Subterranean Magazine, Postscripts and The High Plains Literary Review, and in many anthologies, including The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror (ed. Stephen Jones) and The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror (ed. Ellen Datlow, Kelly Link & Gavin Grant).
Hill’s first book, the limited edition collection 20th Century Ghosts published in 2005 by PS Publishing), showcases fourteen of his short stories and won the Bram Stoker Award for Best Fiction Collection, together with the British Fantasy Award for Best Collection and Best Short Story for “Best New Horror”. In October 2007, Hill’s mainstream US and UK publishers reprinted 20th Century Ghosts, without the extras published in the 2005 slipcased versions, but including one new story.
Hill’s first novel, Heart-Shaped Box, was published by William Morrow/HarperCollins on February 13, 2007 and by Victor Gollancz Ltd in UK in March 2007. Simultaneous to these two editions, a limited edition of Heart-Shaped Box was also released by Subterranean Press; it sold out several months prior to publication. The novel reached number 8 on the New York Times bestseller list on April 1, 2007.
About Locke & Key
Locke & Key tells of Keyhouse, an unlikely New England mansion, with fantastic doors that transform all who dare to walk through them…. and home to a hate-filled and relentless creature that will not rest until it forces open the most terrible door of them all…! Acclaimed suspense novelist and New York Times best-selling author Joe Hill (Heart-Shaped Box) creates an all-new story of dark fantasy and wonder, with astounding artwork from Gabriel Rodriguez.
J. Michael Straczynski, Thor, The Twelve (Marvel)
(born July 17, 1954), known professionally as J. Michael Straczynski and informally as Joe Straczynski or JMS, is an award-winning American writer/producer. He works in a variety of media, including films, television series, novels, short stories, comic books, and radio dramas. He is also a playwright, former journalist and author of The Complete Book of Scriptwriting, a well-regarded tome on the subject. He was the creator and showrunner for the science fiction TV series Babylon 5, its spin-off Crusade, and Jeremiah. Straczynski wrote 92 out of the 110 Babylon 5 episodes, notably including an unbroken 59-episode run through all of the third and fourth seasons, and all but one episode of the fifth season. He also wrote the four Babylon 5 TV movies produced alongside the series.
In 2009, Straczynski was nominated for the BAFTA Award for his screenplay for Changeling.
Straczynski has also been a long-time participant in Usenet and other early computer networks, interacting with fans through various online forums (including GEnie, CompuServe, and America Online) since 1984. He is often credited as being the first TV producer (“showrunner” in Hollywood parlance) to directly engage with fans on the Internet, and have their comments affect the look and feel of his shows (see Babylon 5’s use of the Internet). Two of the more prominent areas where he had a presence were GEnie and the newsgroup rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated. Some of these fans call him The Great Maker (based on a Centauri deity).
Straczynski is a graduate of San Diego State University (SDSU), having earned Bachelor’s degrees in psychology and sociology (with minors in philosophy and literature). While at SDSU, he wrote prolifically for the student newspaper, The Daily Aztec, at times penning so many articles that the paper was jokingly referred to as the “Daily Joe.” Straczynski currently resides in the Los Angeles area.
Mariko Tamaki is a Toronto writer and performer with an avid interest in freaks, weirdos, and other fabulous forms of human behaviour. In the past, Mariko has appeared on stage with a variety of performance troupes, including fat activists Pretty, Porky and Pissed Off, The Corporate Wet Nurse Association, and theatre misfits TOA. In addition to her work in theatre, Mariko has published collections of creative non-fiction: True Lies: The Book of Bad Advice (2002), and Fake ID (2005), and one novella, Cover Me (2000).
Mariko is currently completing work on two graphic novels: Skim, illustrated by her cousin Jillian Tamaki which will be released by Groundwood Books in 2008 and Emiko Superstar, illustrated by Vancouver’s Steve Rolston, which will be released as part of DC Comic’s MINX series in Summer 2008.
In her spare time, Mariko is a columnist for Kiss Machine and Herizons, and a graduate student in Linguistic Anthropology at the University of Toronto where she studies language, performance, and gender.
About Skim:
Skim is a “not-slim” wannabe wiccan goth student at an all-girls catholic school. When popular girl Katie Matthews gets dumped by her athlete boyfriend, who days later kills himself, the entire school goes into mourning overdrive. With the school councilors breathing down her neck and the popular clique (including Katie’s best friend Julie Peters) forming a new club in its wake, Skim finds herself in the crosshairs, deepening her “depression”. And if things cannot get more complicated, Skim starts to fall for an equally quirky teacher.
Matt Wagner, Zorro (Dynamite); Madame Xanadu (Vertigo/DC)
Matt Wagner has enjoyed a career in comics for over twenty years. Born and educated in Pennsylvania, his first published work was a short story that would introduce one of comicdom’s most respected creator-owned characters–the mastermind assassin, GRENDEL. Best known for this epic creation and his other, more personal, allegory, MAGE, Matt has also worked on a variety of established characters. These include his ground-breaking work on the character of Batman villain, Two-Face, in the graphic novel, FACES, as well as a five-year stint both developing and generating the stories for the fan-favorite Vertigo title, SANDMAN MYSTERY THEATRE. His more recent efforts in this vein have included writing the DR. MID-NITE mini-series for DC Comics and serving as the regular cover artist on the Kevin Smith-penned relaunch of GREEN ARROW.
Known for his character-driven stories and his obvious love of the world’s mythologies, Matt has also enjoyed the distinction of being one of the only writer/artists allowed to team his own creation with one of DC’s flagship characters in two successive BATMAN/GRENDEL cross-overs.
In the past few years, Matt has also written and drawn several high profile projects for DC; a three-issue prestige series starring Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman; titled TRINITY and a year-long, project which comprised two mini-series that chronicled some of the earliest aspects of Batman’s career, collectively titled DARK MOON RISING.
This year sees the 25th anniversary of GRENDEL and Matt is hard at work on a variety of projects to commemorate this significant milestone.
Bill Willingham, Fables, House of Mystery (Vertigo/DC)
I’m only posting the first half of this bio, if you want to read the rest you will have to visit Bill’s website. http://www.billwillingham.com/biography.html
Bill Willingham has been writing, and occasionally drawing, funnybooks for 20 years now. Hes also recently taken up writing prose fiction as well. He is best known for creating the following comic book series: Elementals; Ironwood; Coventry; Pantheon; Proposition Player; and currently, Fables. He lives in one of the hot places in the American Southwest.
Here’s the first part of the longer bio. Most of this is true. read more
More about the Eisner Awards
The 2009 Will Eisner Comic Industry Award Nominees
2009 Eisner Award Nominees – Best Short Story
[...] Eisner Award Nominees – Best Writer | Hero Spy [...]