The reasons we love Michaela Coel are endless. Coel is the woman behind one of 2021’s most important TV hits, the award-winning BBC Three drama I May Destroy You. Before this, she also created the breakout E4 comedy, Chewing Gum, and played brilliant roles in series such Black Mirror and Top Boy. 

Coel unflinchingly explores big topics through incredible storytelling: I May Destroy You was inspired by her own experience of rape. And she always has something profound or just totally entertaining to say in interviews (including a conversation with Louis Theroux on his podcast about the ups and downs of her family life).

“I would not enjoy this privilege, this right, to dance, fuck, cry, rage in front of the camera without giving a shit,” she recently said while accepting an RTS award and thanking the “Black women who were visible” while she was growing up. 

That’s why news of Coel’s first book has caused much excitement among her fans. Misfits: A Personal Manifesto is “a powerful manifesto on how speaking your truth and owning your differences can transform your life”.

It will draw on her 2018 Edinburgh Festival MacTaggart lecture, recounting deeply personal anecdotes from her life and work. With insight and wit, it will lay bare her journey to reclaiming her creativity and power, inviting readers to reflect on theirs.

Sharing further details on what to expect from the book, Marianne Tatepo, commissioning editor at Ebury, said in a statement: “Ever since I first watched Chewing Gum, I knew that Michaela was one of a kind. I May Destroy You again proved this to be true, gathering fans everywhere and stealing the hearts of global icons from Adele and Seth Rogan to Barack Obama. 

“By turns inquisitive, devastating, beautiful and hilarious, Michaela’s storytelling forever urges us to think again. Her début, Misfits, draws on the same kaleidoscope of ideas and emotions as her hit TV shows, and will inspire readers to reflect on their own relationship to power. We are proud to be bringing Michaela’s unique voice to a whole new audience.”

Fans don’t have too late to wait for this one. Misfits will be published on 7 September 2021 in hardback at £9.99 by Ebury Press. In the meantime, this is the perfect excuse to revisit some of her best series and films.

Images: Getty, Ebury