David Heatley with Mike Sacks on Qualification

Join Book Culture LIC on Tuesday, October 1st at 6:30pm as we welcome Queens-based author David Heatley for the launch of his graphic memoir, Qualification: A Graphic Memoir in Twelve Steps. David will be joined in conversation by Mike Sacks.

From the author of My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down, a new graphic memoir brimming with black humor, that explores the ultimate irony: the author’s addiction to 12-step programs.

David Heatley had an unquestionably troubled and eccentric childhood: father a sexually repressed alcoholic, mother an overworked compulsive overeater. Then David’s parents enter the world of 12-step programs and find a sense of support and community. It seems to help. David, meanwhile, grows up struggling with his own troublesome sexual urges and seeking some way to make sense of it all. Eventually he starts attending meetings too. Alcoholics Anonymous. Overeaters Anonymous. Debtors Anonymous. Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous. More and more meetings. Meetings for issues he doesn’t have.
With stark, sharply drawn art and unflinching honesty, Heatley explores the strange and touching relationships he develops, and the truths about himself and his family he is forced to confront while “working” an ever-increasing number of programs. The result is a complicated, unsettling, and hilarious journey–of far more than 12 steps.


David Heatley was born and raised in Teaneck, NJ and has lived in Oberlin, Chicago, Oakland, and Brooklyn. He is the author of My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down, and his comics and drawings have since appeared on the cover of The New Yorker, in every section of The New York Times, in New York MagazineGranta, McSweeney’s, Kramer’s Ergot, Best American Comics (cover artist) and Nickelodeon Magazine. He proudly resides in Queens with his wife and two children.

Mike Sacks was born in Virginia and raised in Maryland. He attended Tulane University in New Orleans. He has written for Vanity FairEsquireGQ, The New YorkerTimeThe New York Times, The Washington Post, McSweeney’sRadar, Funny or Die, MADNew York ObserverPremiereBelieverViceMaximWomen’s Health, and Salon. He has worked at The Washington Post, and is currently on the editorial staff of Vanity Fair. He is the author of And Here’s the Kicker: Conversations with 21 Humor Writers About Their CraftYour Wildest Dreams, Within ReasonPoking a Dead Frog, and more.











When: Tue., Oct. 1, 2019 at 6:30 pm
Where: Book Culture LIC
26-09 Jackson Ave.
718-440-3120
Price: Free
Buy tickets/get more info now
See other events in these categories:

Join Book Culture LIC on Tuesday, October 1st at 6:30pm as we welcome Queens-based author David Heatley for the launch of his graphic memoir, Qualification: A Graphic Memoir in Twelve Steps. David will be joined in conversation by Mike Sacks.

From the author of My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down, a new graphic memoir brimming with black humor, that explores the ultimate irony: the author’s addiction to 12-step programs.

David Heatley had an unquestionably troubled and eccentric childhood: father a sexually repressed alcoholic, mother an overworked compulsive overeater. Then David’s parents enter the world of 12-step programs and find a sense of support and community. It seems to help. David, meanwhile, grows up struggling with his own troublesome sexual urges and seeking some way to make sense of it all. Eventually he starts attending meetings too. Alcoholics Anonymous. Overeaters Anonymous. Debtors Anonymous. Sex and Love Addicts Anonymous. More and more meetings. Meetings for issues he doesn’t have.
With stark, sharply drawn art and unflinching honesty, Heatley explores the strange and touching relationships he develops, and the truths about himself and his family he is forced to confront while “working” an ever-increasing number of programs. The result is a complicated, unsettling, and hilarious journey–of far more than 12 steps.


David Heatley was born and raised in Teaneck, NJ and has lived in Oberlin, Chicago, Oakland, and Brooklyn. He is the author of My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down, and his comics and drawings have since appeared on the cover of The New Yorker, in every section of The New York Times, in New York MagazineGranta, McSweeney’s, Kramer’s Ergot, Best American Comics (cover artist) and Nickelodeon Magazine. He proudly resides in Queens with his wife and two children.

Mike Sacks was born in Virginia and raised in Maryland. He attended Tulane University in New Orleans. He has written for Vanity FairEsquireGQ, The New YorkerTimeThe New York Times, The Washington Post, McSweeney’sRadar, Funny or Die, MADNew York ObserverPremiereBelieverViceMaximWomen’s Health, and Salon. He has worked at The Washington Post, and is currently on the editorial staff of Vanity Fair. He is the author of And Here’s the Kicker: Conversations with 21 Humor Writers About Their CraftYour Wildest Dreams, Within ReasonPoking a Dead Frog, and more.

Buy tickets/get more info now