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WATCH: Our Favorite San Diego Comic Con 2020 Panels

by  | July 15
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San Diego Comic Con may have been all virtual this year, but the panels were full of the same pop culture passion and geek fandom that we love. From July 22-July 26, Comic-Con@Home 2020 featured over 350 separate panels over the course of those days, filled to the brim with discussions about our favorite books, comics, movies, shows, games, art, and fan communities.

Below are just a few of the virtual events that we loved the absolute most. We hope you enjoy!

Oh, and by the way: In celebration of SDCC, we’re hosting a final sweepstakes of top upcoming books. Enter for a chance to win the Ultimate SDCC Prize Pack. And as always, follow us on Twitter (@Get_Literary, @GalleryBooks, @SagaSFF, @SimonSchuster) and/or on Instagram (@get.lit.erary, @gallerybooks, @sagasff, @simonandschuster).

Our Top 4 Most Anticipated Events:

THURSDAY, July 23 

(12 pm PST) | All the Starfleet Ladies

From Uhura to Janeway to Burnham, Star Trek has a rich history of portraying complex, powerful female-identifying characters. How do Star Trek authors perceive their role in continuing this legacy in their Star Trek novels? Join Una McCormack (author of Picard: The Last Best Hope), Swapna Krishna (space, tech, and pop culture journalist), author Cassandra Rose Clarke, LJ Jackson (publicity manager at Saga Press), and moderator Kendra James (editor at StarTrek.com), as they examine the ladies of Star Trek from its inception to the present.

SATURDAY, July 25

(1 pm PST) | PICARD 2020: A Literary Retrospective

With the excitement surrounding the new Star Trek series, let’s take a look back at the most bookish captain in Starfleet. How did he evolve on the page and the screen? What do his favorite books and plays say about him as a character and as a leader? Take a deep dive into Picard’s bookshelf with Una McCormack (author of Picard: The Last Best Hope), David Mack (author of Star Trek: More Beautiful Than Death), Stephen Graham Jones (author of The Only Good Indians), Alex White (author of The Big Ship at the End of the Universe), and moderator Ed Schlesinger (senior editor at Gallery Books).

SUNDAY, July 26

(2 pm PST) | Inspired by Real Life: The True Stories Behind Graphic Novel

Author Van Jensen (Two Dead), illustrator Nate Powell (Two Dead, March), author/illustrator Scott Chantler (Bix) and Diana Pho (graphic novels editor), will discuss the true life inspirations, historical fiction, and real-life stories that inspired their graphic novels, and other works. Annalisa Pesek (Library Journal) will moderate the discussion.

TUESDAY, July 28 

(8 pm ET) | SDCC Saga Afterparty: Rebecca Roanhorse and Stephen Graham Jones

All-star authors Rebecca Roanhorse and Stephen Graham Jones will discuss their new and upcoming books, BLACK SUN and THE ONLY GOOD INDIANS, and dive into the inspiration and process behind them, as well as the common themes in their bodies of work. Joe Monti will moderate the discussion.

More Panels & Events We Loved:

Thursday, July 23

Friday, July 24

Saturday, July 25

Sunday, July 26

Be sure to check out Comic Con’s full panel schedule for more!

Books featured:

Star Trek: Picard: The Last Best Hope

Star Trek: Picard: The Last Best Hope

by Una McCormack

An original novel based on the new Star Trek TV series!

A thrilling novel leading into the new CBS series, Una McCormack’s The Last Best Hope introduces you to brand new characters featured in the life of beloved Star Trek captain Jean-Luc Picard—widely considered to be one of the most popular and recognizable characters in all of science fiction.

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The Only Good Indians

The Only Good Indians

by Stephen Graham Jones

“One of 2020’s buzziest horror novels.” —Entertainment Weekly

“More than I could have asked for in a novel.”—Tommy Orange, Pulitzer Prize finalist author of There There

“What Stephen Graham Jones does for me, is create new possibilities for Indigenous storymakers.” —Terese Marie Mailhot, New York Times bestselling author

“A masterpiece. ” —Paul Tremblay, author of A Head Full of Ghosts and The Cabin at the End of the World

A tale of revenge, cultural identity, and the cost of breaking from tradition in this latest novel from the Jordan Peele of horror literature, Stephen Graham Jones.

Seamlessly blending classic horror and a dramatic narrative with sharp social commentary, The Only Good Indians follows four American Indian men after a disturbing event from their youth puts them in a desperate struggle for their lives. Tracked by an entity bent on revenge, these childhood friends are helpless as the culture and traditions they left behind catch up to them in a violent, vengeful way.

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Black Sun

Black Sun

by Rebecca Roanhorse

From the New York Times bestselling author of Star Wars: Resistance Reborn comes the first book in the Between Earth and Sky trilogy, inspired by the civilizations of the Pre-Columbian Americas and woven into a tale of celestial prophecies, political intrigue, and forbidden magic.

A god will return
When the earth and sky converge
Under the black sun

In the holy city of Tova, the winter solstice is usually a time for celebration and renewal, but this year it coincides with a solar eclipse, a rare celestial event proscribed by the Sun Priest as an unbalancing of the world.

Meanwhile, a ship launches from a distant city bound for Tova and set to arrive on the solstice. The captain of the ship, Xiala, is a disgraced Teek whose song can calm the waters around her as easily as it can warp a man’s mind. Her ship carries one passenger. Described as harmless, the passenger, Serapio, is a young man, blind, scarred, and cloaked in destiny. As Xiala well knows, when a man is described as harmless, he usually ends up being a villain.

Crafted with unforgettable characters, Rebecca Roanhorse has created an epic adventure exploring the decadence of power amidst the weight of history and the struggle of individuals swimming against the confines of society and their broken pasts in the most original series debut of the decade.

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More Beautiful Than Death

More Beautiful Than Death

by David Mack

An original novel based on the thrilling new Star Trek movies!

Based on the “Kelvin Universe” movie saga!

Captain James T. Kirk and the Enterprise crew escort Spock’s father, Ambassador Sarek of Vulcan, to a dilithium-rich planet called Akiron. They arrive to find this world under siege by creatures that some of the planet’s denizens believe are demons. Sarek orders Kirk to abandon the mission, but the young captain won’t turn his back on people in danger. After a harrowing encounter with the dark-energy “demons,” Kirk’s belief in a rational universe is challenged by a mystic who insists that it wasn’t coincidence that brought Kirk to Akiron, but the alien equivalent of a Karmic debt.

Meanwhile, aboard the Enterprise, Sarek’s young Vulcan aide L’Nel has a sinister agenda—and its chief objective appears to be the cold-blooded murder of Spock!

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Two Dead

Two Dead

by Van Jensen

From the acclaimed DC Comics writer and the artist of the #1 New York Times bestselling and National Book Award–winning illustrated trilogy March comes a stunning crime noir graphic novel exploring the intertwining threads of crime, conspiracy, racism, and insanity in the post-World War II Deep South.

After World War II, tensions rise in a Southern city ruled by organized crime, touching countless residents as they struggle to make sense of the new world. A sudden act of violence sets off a series of bloody events between the police and mafia as they lash out against one another. As the violence worsens, desperation grows to stop it, by any means necessary.

Told in multiple perspectives—from a seemingly untouchable mafia don, to a gun-happy seasoned detective succumbing to the depths of his schizophrenia, to a newly minted police lieutenant haunted by his recent service in the war, and two African-American brothers, one mired in corruption and the other leading a local militia in an effort to see that justice is served—Two Dead is at once a white-knuckled and unputdownable thriller, a roman à clef inspired by true events, and a book about post-traumatic stress disorder and the underlying social traumas of how war and segregation affect their survivors on all fronts.

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Bix

Bix

by Scott Chantler

From the acclaimed Eisner Award–nominated creator of Two Generals and Northwest Passage comes a gorgeous and spare illustrated exploration of the rapid rise and tragic fall of 1920s legendary jazz soloist Leon “Bix” Beiderbecke.

Told in stunning illustrations, Bix is a near-wordless graphic exploration highlighting the career of Leon Bix Beiderbecke, one of the most innovative jazz soloists of the 1920s next to the legendary Louis Armstrong. While composing and recording some of the landmark music in the early history of genre, Bix struggled with personal demons, facing the disapproval of his conservative parents and an increasing dependence on alcohol. Presented in predominantly silent panels to reflect his rebellious outsider quality and inability to communicate in anything other than his own musical terms, Bix tells the story of a music star’s rapid rise and tragic fall—a metaphor for the glories and risks inherent in the creative life.

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Photo Credit // istock / wacomka

Categories // Bookish Fun

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