John Stanley

, and his creations Melvin Monster and Thirteen(Going on Eighteen); rare drawings and cartoons; and never-before-seen photographs. Bill Schelly tells Stanley's life story through interviews with his family, friends, and colleagues: his childhood in Harlem and the Bronx, life with his strict Irish Catholic mother, his education at Parsons, his first job as an animator at Max Fleischer Studios, and his years working as a commercial artist, before finding his true m tier in comic books during World War II (while battling clinical depression and alcoholism).