Grantland has put up a two-part excerpt from Sean Howe’s highly-anticipated new book: Marvel Comics: The Untold Story.

If you have any interest in Marvel Comics, especially its inner workings, then this appears to be must-reading. In the excerpt, here’s how various Marvel folks from the 1970s era are described:

Don McGregor: “... diminutive, fast-talking, aspiring filmmaker from Rhode Island.”

Steve Gerber: “...a chain-smoking Camus obsessive from St. Louis.”

Gerry Conway: “...the Brooklyn-born prodigy who'd started writing DC Comics when he was 16.”

Steve Englehart: “...a bearded and bespectacled conscientious objector from Indianapolis.”

Alan Weiss: “...a Las Vegas–bred ladies' man who shared a Queens apartment with a rotating cast of five stewardesses.”

Jim Starlin: “...a Detroit-raised greaser and Vietnam veteran.”

Al Milgrom: “...a wisecracking, self-described ‘frat boy’ who'd known Starlin growing up in Detroit."

Frank Brunner: “...a Brooklyn artist with long blond hair, a buckskin jacket, and a library of Carlos Castaneda and H. P. Lovecraft paperbacks.”

Is there any doubt that I want this book? It goes on sale October 9.

[Artwork: Marvel Comics: The Untold Story by Sean Howe]