Gene Luen Yang is one of the most popular and sought after cartoonists in comics, and his original graphic novels, including American Born Chinese and Boxers and Saints, have gained him both critical and commercial acclaim, but it has been nearly three years since his last solo work.

However, revealed today via The Washington Post, Yang is set to release a new original graphic novel titled Dragon Hoops in 2018, which tells the real-life story of a high school basketball team's 2015 season.

The series follows Oakland's Bishop O'Dowd High School's boys basketball team and focuses specifically on six seniors during their last year on the team. Among them is the only Sikh player on the team, and Yang tells The Washington Post “I want to talk about culture and race and religion, and how those things have played into the history of basketball.”

 

Gene Luen Yang
Gene Luen Yang
loading...

 

Although previous works drew heavily on his own experiences as the child of Chinese immigrants to America, Dragon Hoops is his first wholly non-fiction work, and retains the real names of the players involved.

Yang --- who was director of information services and taught computer science at O'Dowd for nearly two decades --- admitted that he doesn't consider himself to be althetic and while he doesn't know much about basketball, the story of the team and the game's community aspect inspired him to learn more about the game.

Dragon Hoops is set to be released in 2018 by First Second Books/MacMillan. More information and character design sheets by Yang can be found at The Washington Post's article, or at Yang's Tumblr.

 

More From ComicsAlliance