Swallow Me Whole is an award-winning love story carried by rolling fog, terminal illness, hallucination, apophenia, insect armies, and unshakeable faith. In his most ambitious book to date, Powell quietly explores the dark corners of adolescence—not the cliched melodramatic outbursts of rebellion, but the countless tiny moments of madness, the vague relief of medication, and the mixed blessing of family ties. As the story unfolds, two stepsiblings hold together amidst schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, family breakdown, animal telepathy, misguided love, and the tiniest hope that everything will someday make sense. Deliberately paced, delicately drawn, and drenched in shadows, Swallow Me Whole is a landmark achievement for Nate Powell and a suburban ghost story that will haunt readers long after its final pages. 2009 Eisner Award Winner for Best Graphic Album (New), Eisner Award Nominee for Best Writer/Artist and Best Lettering, 2009 Los Angeles Times Book Prize Finalist for Young Adult Fiction, Ignatz Award Winner for Outstanding Artist and Outstanding Debut, and official selection of YALSA's Great Graphic Novels For Teens.
Author
Nathan Lee Powell is an American cartoonist and musician. Born in 1978 in Little Rock, Arkansas, Nate spent his childhood in different parts of the country, as his family moved around following his father's duties as an Air Force officer. Powell became active in the punk rock scene since his teen age. He ended up performing in several bands over the years, and even owing a DIY punk record label. At the same time, he developed an interest in visual arts and majored in Cartooning at the School of Visual Arts (SVA) in New York. For about ten years Powell worked as a care giver for adult with developmental disabilities, while also drawing comic books. His major break came with the graphic novel Swallow Me Whole, which won the Ignatz Award for Outstanding Debut and Outstanding Artist in 2008, as well as the Eisner Award for Best Original Graphic Novel in 2009. Between 2013 and 2016 Nate Powell released what remains his most famous work, the three volumes of March, a comic biography of civil rights activist and Congressman John Lewis.
