R.L. Stine’s GARBAGE PAIL KIDS #1: WELCOME TO SMELLVILLE Publishing September 29th
Josh Millican
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Andrew Smith, Senior Vice President and Publisher of Abrams’ Children’s Books, announced today the forthcoming publication of Garbage Pail Kids #1: Welcome to Smellville, the first book in a brand-new middle-grade series inspired by the Garbage Pail Kids (GPK), the pop culture phenomenon from The Topps Company that first launched in 1985 as collectible sticker cards and has since grown to include merchandise such as T-shirts, toys, mobile and board games, and more.
Written by bestselling author R. L. Stine—whose Goosebumps and Fear Street series have sold more than 400 million copies combined—Welcome to Smellville will release in hardcover, eBook, and audio editions on September 29th, 2020. The books will feature cover art by Joe Simko and interior illustrations by Jeff Zapata, both mainstay artists for the GPK brand for Topps. Each book in the series will be packaged with four exclusive, collectible sticker cards. The deal for three books, including world rights, was negotiated by Charles Kochman, Editorial Director at Abrams, with Ira Friedman, Vice President of Global Licensing at Topps. Kochman will edit the books.
Stine’s vision for the book series plays up GPK’s wacky, fun characters and their hilarious adventures. People may think that the Garbage Pail Kids are gross and weird and strange, but they’re not bad kids—they just don’t know any better. In Welcome to Smellville, the Garbage Pail Kids—everyone from Adam Bomb to Brainy Janie to Junkfood John to Nervous Rex—get into mischief at their middle school, all while battling bullies and their archenemies, the Perfects. If only their science teacher, Mrs. Hooping-Koff, can get them to focus on their homework instead of trying to out-gross one another in class throughout the semester, they just might graduate. But what would be the fun in that?
“The Garbage Pail Kids are ghastly, loud, messy, out of control . . . out of their minds. In other words, MY kind of kids!” says Stine. “I’m hoping to create a book series that captures all the loopy slapstick fun of these uniquely awful characters, to get all middle-grade kids reading—and laughing.”
The Topps Company—along with a stable of legendary underground cartoonists, including Art Spiegelman, Mark Newgarden, and John Pound—created Garbage Pail Kids in 1985. The gross-out humor and subversive attitude appealed to kids of the time and quickly became a massive success. As the notoriety of Garbage Pail Kids grew, so too did its popularity on the playground. School administrators banned Garbage Pail Kids from school grounds, further fueling the demand for additional card series. Thirty-five years later, Garbage Pail Kids continues to resonate and has become a notable part of a retro revival of all things 1980s.
“R. L. Stine’s gifted storytelling and enormous youth following offers the Garbage Pail Kids franchise the opportunity to connect with a new generation,” says Ira Friedman. “While our brand’s community of lifelong collectors remains as passionate as ever, we’re also very excited to see GPK reengage with the audience where it all started: kids! We can’t wait to celebrate our thirty-fifth anniversary throughout the year leading up to the release of Welcome to Smellville in October!”
R. L. Stine is the bestselling author of the Fear Street and Goosebumps series, the latter of which is the second bestselling children’s series of all time. In its three decades of publication, Goosebumps has become a multimedia sensation, with two motion pictures, a television series, and six video game adaptations. R. L. Stine lives in New York City.
Are you a fan of R.L. Stine and/or Garbage Pail Kids? Are you excited to check out Welcome to Smellville? Let us know in the comments below or on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram! You can also carry on the convo with me personally on Twitter @josh_millican.
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