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Although not growing up hearing or speaking Korean, at least through her parents and family, Axie Oh was extremely interested in the culture and history of Korea. She largely credits the substance of her debut novel to the culture of "K-pop." If you are familiar with the sub-culture of K-pop you can easily see the connections most easily in the beginning of the novel amongst the main character's high school experience and the way they dress and act.

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Rebel Seoul is her debut and only literary work.

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While it was extremely refreshing to finally see representation of Korean culture, I feel like the author may have tried too hard to incorporate all aspects of both K-pop, School, Government, and Business.

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While Civil War wasn't Mark Millar's first comic arc it is easily his most ambitious and successful. While superhuman registration is an idea toyed with a lot in recent media such as "The Incredibles" or "Watchmen." While he thought the idea was overdone, when approached by Marvel to write one of their large comic events he pitched the idea of "Civil War" and it instantly took off becoming one of the most widely known comic events and most recently receiving a film adaptation.

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Kingsman, War Heros, Wolverine, Ultimate X-men, and The Ultimates.

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Shel Silverstein was born on September 25, 1930 in Chicago, Illinois, and began writing and drawing at a young age. He became a cartoonist, playwright, poet, performer, recording artist, and Grammy-winning, Oscar-nominated songwriter. Throughout his life he has experienced many different obstacles and situations making for excellent memory driven poems that can make you laugh or cry and possibly both.

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A Light in The Attic, The Giving Tree, and Falling up.

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Norton Juster was born during the Great Depression in Brooklyn, New York.  He originally studied architecture but ended up joining the Navy in 1952.  It was here that he drew inspiration for his first two novels, "The Phantom Tolbooth" and "The Dot and The Line."  The Phantom Tolbooth is highly regarded as one of the best children's books of all time and it isn't difficult to see why.  All of the personifications and ridiculously brilliant characters really encapsulate an imaginative reader's mind.

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The Dot and The Line, The Odious Ogre, Otter Nonsense, and Neville.

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Rick Riordan was born in Texas and for most of his life he taught English to public and private middle schools in the bay area.  His main inspiration was his son Haley, "I had taught Greek myths for many years, so I was glad to comply. When I ran out of myths, he was disappointed and asked me if I could make up something new with the same characters. I thought about it for a few minutes. Then I remembered a creative writing project I used to do with my sixth graders — I would let them create their own demigod hero, the son or daughter of any god they wanted, and have them describe a Greek-style quest for that hero. Off the top of my head, I made up Percy Jackson and told Haley all about his quest to recover Zeus’ lightning bolt in modern day America. It took about three nights to tell the whole story, and when I was done, Haley told me I should write it out as a book."

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Percy Jackson series, The Heros of Olympus series, The Trials of Apollo series, and The Kane Chronicles series.

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http://blog.leeandlow.com/2017/09/14/interview-axie-oh-author-rebel-seoul/

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Rebel Soul should be made into a drama, which is one of the highest compliments we can give to a book. If you haven't read it yet, get a copy for summer and take a day or two off because you won't be able to put it down.

Author Axie Oh graciously answered a few of our questions about her writing process for Rebel Seoul and dropped some exciting news about the upcoming sequel!

Publisher's summary:
Pacific Rim meets Korean action dramas in this mind-blowing, New Visions Award-winning science fiction debut. After a great war, the East Pacific is in ruins. In brutal Neo Seoul, where status comes from success in combat, ex-gang member Lee Jaewon is a talented pilot rising in the ranks of the academy. Abandoned as a kid in the slums of Old Seoul by his rebel father, Jaewon desires only to escape his past and prove himself a loyal soldier of the Neo State. When Jaewon is recruited into the most lucrative weapons development division in Neo Seoul, he is eager to claim his best shot at military glory. But the mission becomes more complicated when he meets Tera, a test subject in the government's supersoldier project. Tera was trained for one purpose: to pilot one of the lethal God Machines, massive robots for a never-ending war. With secret orders to report on Tera, Jaewon becomes Tera's partner, earning her reluctant respect. But as respect turns to love, Jaewon begins to question his loyalty to an oppressive regime that creates weapons out of humans. As the project prepares to go public amidst rumors of a rebellion, Jaewon must decide where he stands-as a soldier of the Neo State, or a rebel of the people. How did you get started writing? Were there any particular books or writers that made you realize you wanted to be a writer?
I didn't start writing until college where I took classes in narrative nonfiction, fiction and poetry. I discovered my joy of writing through these classes, and in between them, would often write short stories and flash fiction in the student lounge for fun.

I've been an avid reader since I was young-my favorite novelists included J.K Rowling, Garth Nix, Cameron Dokey, Tanith Lee and Philip Pullman. I didn't read or discover Asian authors until I was in college. Then, some of my favorite authors became Cindy Pon, Julie Kagawa, Noriko Ogiwara and Marie Lu. I started to aspire to be a writer after discovering these authors whose books I enjoyed and whose careers I admired.
In your previous interviews about REBEL SEOUL, you've said that the book started with a dream you had. How did you go about developing this image into a story? What were your first steps?
I wrote down all the different snippets and scenes that excited me about this book. I wrote the ending before the middle and scenes that didn't make any sense out of context but I wrote because I wanted to somehow get them in the book. For example, there's a scene in REBEL SEOUL where my protagonist converses with an old grandfather. This was one of the first scenes I wrote, though it appears in the latter half of the book. I wrote it because I loved this grandfather character who was so wise and spoke in riddles. After I compiled all the snippets and scenes, I created the world, characters and plot and threaded them together like beads on a string.
You've also mentioned that you did a lot of research on colonialism in Korea for REBEL SEOUL. What did you discover that you felt you absolutely needed to incorporate into the story?
Though REBEL SEOUL is a young adult story set in an alternate-future, I wanted to incorporate themes and ideologies that were a part of Korea's past, particularly the colonial era-themes of resistance and regaining nationhood, sovereignty and independence.
Neo Seoul and Old Seoul are fully-realized places, and the shift in mood and atmosphere whenever the story changes locations is really clear to the readers. How did you go about creating and populating these two distinct worlds-did you write down a history for each place or draw maps, what were the tools you used to build such complex and vivid worlds?
All I used was an actual map of Seoul as it stands today, dividing "Neo" and "Old" as South and North of the Han River, a natural geographical divider. In crafting the two halves of the city, I imagined the "Neo" part as a high tech anime-influenced cyberpunk city and the "Old" half as present-day Seoul but a little more run down. Any strength in descriptions is due to the vivid and complexity of the city itself, a place that has old world buildings alongside skyscrapers and modern architecture.
What were the decisions behind Jaewon's character, especially in terms of his background, the moral choices he has to face, and his feelings for Tera? Why did you think it was important to centre the narrative on him?
I chose Jaewon as my protagonist because he was a character who had a connection to both Old Seoul and Neo Seoul and I thought the world could really come alive through his point of view. He also had the most compelling emotional journey, as someone who begins the novel hurt and closed-off due to betrayals in his past and ends the novel with new friends and hope for a brighter future.
After REBEL SEOUL was published, did anything happen that was completely unexpected for you (with regards to publication or even the book promotions)?
One of the best surprises was that REBEL SEOUL was praised by the New York Times Book Review as "moody, explodey fun." Another unexpected moment was when my publisher came to me asking for another book in the REBEL SEOUL universe. The sequel, currently untitled, is set to be released Fall 2019.
As one of the few published WOC writers out there, based on your experiences, what do you think are the biggest challenges for fellow POC/WOC writers and do you have any advice on overcoming them?
The biggest challenge always are the naysayers, the people who say "books by people of color don't sell" (this is a big lie), the people who say "this genre is dead" (no, your take on POC vampires is very much needed), or the people who say "diverse books are a trend" (big eye roll). Don't listen to these people. Listen to yourself that yearns to write a book that you as a child would have loved to read.

Remember those books I read as a child? I loved them, but they were all written by white authors because that's all I had access to. The fact that kids nowadays have choices is incredible - they can read books by and about people who look like them. That is so empowering. I'm very excited for the future of publishing.

About Axie Oh:

Axie Oh is a first generation Korean American, born in NYC and raised in New Jersey. She studied Korean history and creative writing as an undergrad at the University of California - San Diego and holds an MFA from Lesley University in Writing for Young People. Her passions include K-pop, anime, stationery supplies, and milk tea. She currently resides in Las Vegas, Nevada with her puppy, Toro.

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Rebel Soul should be made into a drama, which is one of the highest compliments we can give to a book. If you haven't read it yet, get a copy for summer and take a day or two off because you won't be able to put it down.

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http://www.syfy.com/syfywire/civil-war-comic-writer-mark-millar-was-not-fan-film-adaptation

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For many Marvel Comics fans, May 3rd will mark the beginning of the summer blockbuster season. That's the day the first issue of "Civil War" arrives, a seven -issue mini-series by Mark Millar and Steve McNiven hits stores. CBR News spoke with Millar about the mini-series, which sends the Marvel heroes down the path to war not against the forces of evil, but each other.

When Millar arrived at the Marvel summit where "Civil War" was born he had no idea he would be the one to chronicle the company's next mega story. "I only had about eight weeks before I was taking some time off and I was at this meeting laughing because I knew Brian Bendis would get talked into doing the next cross over," Millar told CBR News. "I was saying to Brian, 'Ha-ha. You know how you work twenty hours every day? Soon it's going to be twenty three hours every day and I'm going to be having a great time for six months just doing nothing.' For some reason, between mocking Bendis and getting on my plane, I ended up writing 'Civil War.' I have no idea what the hell happened. I just got so excited about it. I thought it was one of those projects that I would actually have done within a couple of months, but it ended up being bloody huge. I'm constantly tweaking it and rewriting it just because it involves so many characters. It's much, much bigger than I expected."

The big idea that evolved into "Civil War" was born while Millar and Bendis were out one morning before the summit. "We were out shopping for presents for our daughters and Bendis said to me, 'I don't like the sound of the crossovers they're talking about.' And he said, 'What if we do SHIELD versus the Marvel Universe?'" Millar explained. "I thought, 'Hrmm. It's kind of interesting.' Then he said, 'I've been setting up this stuff in 'Avengers,' where the superheroes have to reveal their secret identities or SHIELD will go out and force everyone to do so.' I liked his idea, but I felt as if the whole superhero registration act thing had sort of been done in things like 'Watchmen' and 'The Incredibles.' I also felt SHIELD had been used too much.

"I said to Brian, 'I don't know. I think there is something there,'" Millar continued. "A project that Brian Hitch and I were working on as our follow up to 'The Ultimates' was originally titled 'Civil War.' I actually borrowed some of the ideas from that; brought them forward and I thought 'What if instead of SHIELD versus the heroes, it's the heroes versus the heroes? And instead of being the secret identities which has been done before maybe these guys are being asked to work for the federal government and some of them are agreeing to do it and other ones are not. It's an ideological split down the middle."

Some readers might be incorrectly try to frame the ideological split in "Civil War" as Conservative versus Liberal. "It's really lazy writing to make everything black and white," Millar said. "I'm a politics buff and I really hate seeing America divided into red and blue states because I know people in red states who have blue opinions. And we're all very complex. No one person can really even be described as a liberal or a conservative. "I'm a liberal but I totally believe in the death penalty on occasions. People are more complex than you think and I wanted to do the same thing with superheroes.

"The most obvious thing to do would have been to have Captain America as a lap dog of the government," Millar continued. "So, I've played around with everyone's personalities a little and really just tried to get in under their skin and have them feeling very confused about it, too. Some of them actually end up changing their minds and crossing sides because it's a very complex issue.

"So, to polarize it in terms of Conservative and Liberal would have been a big mistake. And I think you don't want to think of your superheroes as being Liberal or Conservative. I think those guys should be above that. What I've done is made everyone sympathetic, but everyone pretty passionate about what they believe in."

The passionate beliefs of the combatants in "Civil War" will gradually motivate them to do things they didn't believe they were capable of. "You have to think, 'Well, if it's called 'Civil War,' there's got to be some casualties there,'" Millar stated. "There's going to be people getting seriously hurt and maybe even dieing. So, escalating everything from an argument to an outright battle across the Marvel Universe was a real challenge. On page two, Captain America does not decide to kill somebody. It's a very gradual thing over the seven issues where you see things escalating from an argument into an all out war."

The two opposing sides in the all out war will find themselves equally matched. "I'm hesitant to make anyone the underdog because that immediately makes the reader empathize with them more than the other guys," Millar explained. "What I've done is I've got very powerful characters on both sides. Iron Man is enormously powerful. In some sense, he's really turned himself with the armor into Marvel's Superman. Then counter that with someone like Captain America, whose actual super power is almost his tactical military genius. Nobody can beat Cap in a fight. So, that's really interesting I've just had to try and be a bit more imaginative in how I have these conflicts carry out."

The conflicts in "Civil War" will involve most of the Marvel heroes, but the book will also focus on a core cast. "There's maybe about five really principal players in there," Millar said. "Obviously there's Cap and Iron Man. Also Spider-Man and Sue Storm are a big deal. Outside of that there's a few kind of floating characters as well. Two of which will be a big deal and can't be revealed just now."

Millar has had a blast working with the majority of the characters in the Marvel Universe and has carefully crafted "Civil War" so that even the smaller players get a chance to shine. "I made sure pretty much that everybody gets a little bit of screen time," He said. "I didn't want to leave anyone out. I've been quite lucky. 'The Ultimates' is a fairly broad book that covers a lot of characters. I've had a crack at 'Spider-Man' and I've also done an X-book, but just to get a little scene in there with Black Panther and another little scene with Dr. Strange, that was exciting."

When it comes to the actual battles that the characters in "Civil War" will be fighting, readers shouldn't expect the anti-registration side to just be reactive in fighting for their cause. "They will be a combination of both reactive and proactive," Millar explained. "I didn't want to just have these guys in, say, like a terrorist cell or anything because fundamentally Cap's guys are superheroes. So, the rationale for the Marvel Universe shouldn't be that they're just underground guys who are constantly fighting the forces of the status quo. They've got to be superheroes. They've got to go out and actually fight super villains and, unfortunately, SHIELD and the other superheroes are after them when they're doing so. It's an added tension to the whole thing."

"Civil War" is a conflict between the heroes of the Marvel Universe, but the villains do a play a role in the series. Millar is keeping their part in the story a secret, but he did reveal that he would be touching on an idea from his "Marvel Knights Spider-Man" run in which a secret cabal of industrialists conspired to create many of the costumed villains in the Marvel Universe. "There's some stuff going on with the villains about half way through the book, but really the main focus of the series is the split between the heroes and the other stuff is just really seasoning."

The split between the heroes is over the superhuman registration act, which mandates that anyone who puts on a costume and goes out to try and enforce the law must register with and become an agent of the federal government. Heroes who violate the law will find themselves imprisoned in newly redesigned secretive superhuman penitentiaries. "That's actually quite a big plot point," Millar stated. "There's a whole new way of storing super villains and heroes who refuse to sign. It's quite a big deal. We're really updating the Marvel Universe in a lot of ways."

"Civil War" will also address how countries around the world view the US government's new policy on super humans. Some of the fictional Marvel countries that don't exactly see eye to eye with the US, like Wakanda, Latveria, Atlantis, and Providence, might even become embroiled in the events of the story. "Some will be involved quite a bit and others will remain neutral and others might come in at a later stage," Millar explained. "That's part of the meat of the story really."

The various countries of the Marvel Universe will have different degrees of participation in "Civil War," but the globe spanning organization SHIELD will play a definite part in the mega-story. "SHIELD's new boss Maria Hill isn't quite as cozy with the superheroes as Nick Fury was," Millar stated. "So, that works very well within the scenario. It would have been a lot harder to do this if Nick, who is very pro-superhero, was in charge because he would have been probably against the registration act, whereas, Maria Hill made the story a whole lot easier for that."

When Millar's epic story is over, he hopes readers enjoy the ride that he took them on. "I want them to get the same kind of fun out of it as I got out of 'Crisis on Infinite Earths' or one of the big crossovers like 'Secret Wars,'" Millar said.

After "Civil War" is complete Millar won't be immediately building upon the story foundations he lays down in the series. "I've been very lucky while I've been at Marvel. I've always been doing top five books," Millar stated. "I've never been involved with anything quite this big. I was shocked when I saw the numbers and I know what's happening over issues two and three. The sales on this thing are going to be nuts. So, I'm kind of annoyed with myself for not immediately following this with a book because I know all the books that I'm setting up in 'Civil War' are going to be huge; the ones that spin out of it.

"All my friends are going to make a fortune on this thing and meanwhile I'll be off doing some stupid creator owned thing," Millar joked. "But, Brian Hitch and I are doing something gigantic. You won't hear about it till the end of the year and it will be out in 2007. It's a mainstream Marvel book."

For Millar, "Civil War" has been a difficult, but immensely gratifying tale to tell. "I've had a good time on it and it's been an awful lot of work," Millar said. "If I knew how much work it would have been I probably wouldn't have started doing it. It's been difficult but so rewarding when I see it coming back looking so good.

"Steve McNiven is just the greatest find," Millar continued. "Marvel is really lucky to have him. He's brilliant and it's really exciting for me seeing the pages coming in."
Related Articles
[ CBR NOTE: Did you know CBR hosts a Civil War Forum where you can ask questions of Editor Tom Brevoort? Well, now you do! Hop on over and join the discussions. Plus, tomorrow we'll bring you highlights of those questions already asked of Tom Brevoort in a special Q&A article.]

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Our Marvels At War: Millar talks "Civil War"

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The road to "Civil War" has begun and on May 3rd the Marvel Universe will be plunged into chaos as its champions are split into opposing camps in the pages of "Civil War" #1. CBR News spoke with "Civil War" writer Mark Millar about his epic tale.

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http://performingsongwriter.com/shel-silverstein/

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http://www.underdown.org/juster.htm

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Norton Juster Interview: Juster on The Phantom Tollbooth and His Childhood | Scholastic

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Interview with Norton Juster: What inspired the wordplay in The Phantom Tollbooth? Where did you get the idea for The Phantom Tollbooth? When you were a child, did you pr

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http://rickriordan.com/about/an-interview-with-rick/

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Rick Riordan talks about The Lost Hero - Scholastic Kids' Club