THUNDEROUS, the debut graphic novel from Poet Laureate M.L Smoker, Natalie Peeterse & Dale Deforest, is a Native American focused Middle Grade fantasy adventure that centers on a young Lakota girl, Aiyana as she is transported from our world into the same spirit world from her grandmother’s traditional teachings and cultural stories. Through her journey to get back home, she learns to appreciate her family’s prized heritage.
This is a fantastic story created by a truly powerhouse team of Native American Creators full of dynamic characters. You can order your copies NOW through the American Bookseller Association’s Order Page to get an Independent Bookstore Day version of THUNDEROUS.
The order form will close on February 4.
THUNDEROUS
Published by Dynamite Entertainment
Written by: M.L. Smoker and Natalie Peeterse
Illustrated by: Dale Ray Deforest
ISBN: 9781948206464
Price: $16.99 USD, $22.99 CAD, £14.99 GBP
Ages: 8-12
Genre(s): Juvenile Fiction / Legends, Myths, Fables / Indigenous Peoples of the Americas / Comics & Graphic Novels / Action & Adventure / Fantasy
Page Count: 96 pages
Format: Softcover
On Sale: May 31, 2022
Creator Bio(s)
M.L. SMOKER belongs to the Assiniboine and Sioux tribes of the Fort Peck Reservation in north-eastern Montana. She is Montana’s current Poet Laureate. She holds an MFA from the University of Montana in Missoula, where she was the recipient of the Richard Hugo Fellowship. She is also a graduate of Pepperdine University, and attended UCLA and the University of Colorado. Smoker Broaddus currently works for the Office of Public Instruction as the Director of Indian Education. She has spent the past seven years overseeing the work of statewide Indian Education for All Efforts and the Schools of Promise initiative, which seeks to turnaround the states lowest performing schools. In 2015, she was named the Indian Educator of Year by the National Indian Education Association. She was also recently appointed to the National Advisory Council on Indian Education by President Barack Obama. She was formerly an administrator in her home community of Frazer, Montana for three years. She has taught courses at Fort Peck Community College and the University of Montana. She has published one collection of poems, Another Attempt at Rescue (Hanging Loose Press, 2005). She has also served as a writer and consultant on the PBS documentaries Before There Were Parks and Indian Relay (which earned her a regional Emmy award).
NATALIE PEETERSE has an MFA from the University of Montana. Her chapbook Black Birds : Blue Horse, An Elegy won the Gold Line Press Poetry Prize in 2011. A second chapbook, Dreadful : Luminosity, Letters, was published by Educe Press in the spring of 2017. She was included in I Go to the Ruined Place: Contemporary Poems in Defense of Global Human Rights (Lost Horse Press), and several other anthologies. She has been a fellow with the Arizona Commission on the Arts, a participant at the Squaw Valley Community of Writers, an artist in residence at the Caldera Institute, a participant in the 2018 US Poets in Mexico in Merida, Yucatan and most recently a Visiting Scholar at the University of Washington’s Whiteley Center at the Friday Harbor Laboratories. She is a recipient of the 2013 Artist Innovation Award by the Montana Arts Council. She lives in Helena, Montana.
DALE RAY DEFOREST grew up in the 4-Corners area of the Navajo Nation, around Shiprock and Farmington, New Mexico. He graduated High School from the Navajo Preparatory School in 1995 then studied 2-D Arts and Photography at the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe; also graduated IAIA in the summer of 2000. Dale’s primary practice is sequential and Digital Illustration. He employs high-contrast and thick lines to convey bold imagery matched with bright and vivid colors. Artwork that can be used to not only express, but captivate and manipulate thought and action has always been Dale’s goal as an artist.