Entertainment Weekly have the exclusive first look at Tillie Walden’s next graphic novel, “Are You Listening?,” which will be published by First Second Books in Fall 2019. It is described as “a heart-wrenching story of survival, a brutally honest depiction of a young woman trying to heal after a traumatic sexual assault.”
This will be the third graphic novel by the Eisner Award-winning Walden at First Second Books in as many years, following the publication of her graphic memoir “Spinning” in 2017, and the print edition of her sci-fi webcomic “On a Sunbeam” (which won our award for Best Reprinted Edition of 2018) was released in October. Walden has spoken about how Studio Ghibli “completely shaped my visual vocabulary and how I think about stories,” and the new book is similarly described by the publisher as “featur[ing] magical settings inspired by the great Hayao Miyazaki.”
“Are You Listening?” will be published September 10, 2019, and is available to pre-order now. In the meantime, head on over to Entertainment Weekly for a ten-page preview of the book. This is the latest in a series of surprise announcements from First Second for the holidays: yesterday saw the unveiling of the cover for the English translation of Janne Kukkonen’s “Lily the Thief,” and a preview of Ben Hatke’s “Mighty Jack And Zita The Spacegirl” posted at The A.V. Club (a book that will also be published in September 2019).
