Just two months after his sister Zoe Sugg, known online as Zoella, smashed records with her debut novel Girl Online, Joe Sugg has been signed to write a graphic novel.
Sugg, who has over 3.5m subscribers to his YouTube channel, will make his literary debut this September, courtesy of publisher Hodder & Stoughton. His graphic novel will tell the story of a “socially isolated girl who fights to save a virtual world – created as a safe place for her by her dying father – from descending into mayhem”, said Hodder.
The author Matt Whyman will help Sugg to “shape and marshal his ideas”, with an illustrator also to be appointed. Sugg’s older sister, Zoe, came under fire in December after it emerged that her young adult novel Girl Online had been written with the help of a ghost writer, Siobhan Curham. But the controversy did not impact on the novel’s sales – after becoming the fastest selling debut since records began, racking up sales of 78,109 copies in its first week in shops, Girl Online has now sold over quarter of a million copies.
Hodder senior editor Briony Gowlett called Sugg “an amazing young talent”, describing his YouTube videos, on his channel ThatcherJoe, as “some of the most inventive around”.
“This imagination will shine out of every page of his book,” said Gowlett. “Joe keeps his audience at the heart of everything he does and this project will be no different.”
The graphic novel will include references from Sugg’s “life and online antics”, said Hodder. “[It] will be an immersive adventure but will also touch upon many of the issues that his fans face every day,” added the publisher.
Sugg has been making videos since 2011, with his output including pranks, impressions and challenges. “The big surprise is I am releasing a book. But it’s not just a book, it’s what called a graphic novel,” Sugg revealed on his YouTube channel yesterday. “A graphic novel is a fictional story in a comic book style ... I’m working with an amazing team, team Sugg, which consists of me, an amazing writer called Matt, and an illustrator, and together we’re going to bring you the best story/cartoonish graphic novely like ball of amazingness.”
He said he wanted his fans to choose the name of his main character – a teenage girl who is bullied and teased at school, and online – adding that the project was “very special” to him, as he used to collect comics, and designed his own, getting into graphic novels during his GCSEs and A-levels.
