Announcement: Stuart McMillen signs publishing contract with Scribe for debut book

Today I am proudly announcing that I have signed a contract with Scribe Publications for my debut graphic novel The Town Without Television.

Here is a video that I just published to my public YouTube channel explaining the news:

( Click here to watch the above video )

...but below is a video that I shot specifically for my Patreon supporters, to go into a little extra detail about this publishing contract:

( Click here to watch the above video )

This second video is a little less polished, a little less formal than the main video, but tells you a little more about what I've been working on recently.

(Note that I shot these videos in October 2022, hoping to publish in Nov/Dec 2022. However, we had to delay the publication of the announcement video until March 2023. So keep this in mind whenever I say "this year" and "next year" in the video!)

This announcement a long time coming!

As mentioned in my video, I've been quietly working away on this book contract since January 2022, but am only now at the point of announcing the news! Sorry for the period of relative quietness in recent months.

I have now had initial meetings with my editor at Scribe, and we are hatching a plan for adapting the existing comics content into a book-ready format. As well as thinking about how to extend the material so that it feels like it fully belongs in the book format.

Press release: full details about the acquisition announcement

Below is the press release that Scribe published this morning, announcing this signing.

Scribe is delighted to announce the acquisition of The Town Without Television by Stuart McMillen. Known for his nonfiction web comics about social issues involving science, economics, and psychology — such as the viral hit ‘Rat Park’, describing the famous 1970s study of drug addiction — for his first book-length work, Stuart is taking a deep dive into another classic sociology study.

By 1973, television had swept the world, outpacing researchers’ efforts to measure its impact. So when Canadian psychologist Tannis MacBeth discovered a town deep in the Rocky Mountain Trench that had no access to television, she saw an astonishing opportunity and took it. Through a compelling and accessible graphic narrative, The Town Without Television will tell the full story of the never-to-be-repeated ‘before’ and ‘after’ study of the ways that TV changed an ordinary community, sharing findings that continue to be relevant today.

Senior editor David Golding says, ‘Like many people, I’ve read Stuart’s work online — including the first two chapters of The Town Without Television. His research is impeccable, his storytelling is deft, and I’m excited to be working with him on bringing this story to the page. Scribe has a proud history of publishing popular works on psychology and social science, and this is the perfect book for us to expand that history into the medium of comics.’

Stuart says, ‘I am thrilled to have signed this publishing contract with Scribe. This will be my first full-length book, and I am looking forward to bringing my comics to a new audience. I’m keen to share the story of Tannis MacBeth’s landmark experiment with readers, as well as reflecting on what her research means in the 21st century.’

Scribe will publish The Town Without Television in 2025.