Writer Brad Meltzer and cartoonist Chris Eliopoulos’ Ordinary People Change the World books have been entertaining kids and satisfying parents for a decade, even inspiring the PBS cartoon series Xavier Riddle and the Secret Museum. But the duo are about to take their biographies of historical figures for the five-to-eight-year-old set somewhere they’ve never gone before: the DC Comics universe.
Penguin Random House will produce “Stories Change the World”, a series of biographical picture books based on the lives of DC superheroes. Meltzer and Eliopoulos will kick things off with Batman and Superman.
I Am Batman
The Dark Knight. The Caped Crusader. The World’s Greatest Detective.
Yet before Batman became the protector of Gotham City, he was Bruce Wayne—a young boy full of fears after losing his parents. And even before that, he was simply an idea in the minds of artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger, who wanted to show people the power of an ordinary person.
Order the book HERE.
It might seem like an odd leap for a series about the real-life achievements of figures like Martin Luther King Jr., Jane Goodall, or Neil Armstrong to branch out into full fictional characters like Bruce Wayne or Clark Kent. Metzler said it all fell under the same headings of wanting to inspire kids as they get entertained.
“These books exist because I want my kids to have better values than what society seems to be feeding them online,” Metzler says. “I am Superman is all about the power of kindness and being a good person and I am Batman is about determination. Sadly, these are values that seems to be under attack these days. Speaking for myself, those values are what the characters gave me as a kid. It’s an idea that’s endlessly powerful.”
I Am Superman
Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound…
Yet before he was Superman, he was rocketed from the planet Krypton and raised as Clark Kent by two of the kindest, nicest people in Smallville. And even before that, he was simply an idea in the minds of two creative teenagers, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. At seventeen years old, they gave the world something to believe in.
Order the book HERE.
