Talking with Tim

Elizabeth Genco caught my attention a month or so back, with a post she did for Blog@Newsarama on “How to Get Your Indie Book into Comic Shops”. If more indie creators sought the counsel of retailers like she did , I think we’d see a great deal more successfully marketed projects. I contacted her to discuss her upcoming work, Blue–partially because I respected her marketing savvy.

Here’s the official word on the project:

“BLUE
by Elizabeth Genco w/art by Sami Makkonen, coming July 2008 from Desperado Publishing. Available for pre-order in MAY 08 PREVIEWS (MAY083778). Preview pages HERE.

A fresh, fantastic take on the bloodiest of classic fairy tales. When Blue’s ex-boyfriend appears on her doorstep, he says he wants to make things right. His true intentions are far more sinister. Blue’s shape-shifting powers can help her outrun him, but to survive, she must face him as herself.”

And, rather than trying to summarize her diverse bio, I merely direct you to go here. Finally, I am fairly certain this is the first time I have interviewed a busker–I could be wrong.

Tim O’Shea: How did you end up collaborating with Finnish artist Sami Makkonen?

Elizabeth Genco: Oh, gosh, I’m not even sure anymore! I think I first found his work on The Engine, maybe? I can’t remember exactly, but I do remember thinking, “This guy is the bomb… he’s probably got starving writers crawling all over him… he’ll never have time for l’il old me!” But I tend to be pretty ballsy when it comes to approaching artists, so I just gave it a shot.

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Last month, after reading Whitney (Pop Candy) Matheson’s review of Robert Schnakenberg’s new book, Secret Lives of Great Authors, I tracked down the author to interview him. In addition to discussing the new book, Schnakenberg took questions about the upcoming release of his revised Encyclopedia Shatnerica (about all things William Shatner, set for an August 2008 release) as well as a new Christopher Walken A-to-Z book (set for October 2008 release). But the bulk of this interview covered the book that answers such questions as “Is it true that J. D. Salinger drank his own urine? Why was Ayn Rand such a big fan of Charlie’s Angels?” My thanks to Schnakenberg for his time.

Tim O’Shea: How often in trying to research facts for Secret Lives did you find out the anecdote was not true?

Robert Schnakenberg: That happened occasionally. Sometimes I’d find a really good anecdote about someone, and then another source would say that it happened to someone else entirely. You know, one book says it happened to Ernest Hemingway, another says it happened to F. Scott Fitzgerald. That happens with quotes a lot. They are always attributed to two or three different people. So you throw those out, or you find the one source that you trust and you go with that. I can’t promise that every anecdote in my book is 100% true—I mean, I wasn’t in the men’s room with Hemingway and Fitzgerald when they compared schlongs—but I can say everything is reliably sourced. Double and triple sourced, in fact, as much as possible.

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In writing words of praise for Debbie Drechsler, I must concede I’m joining a bandwagon that started in 1995 when her work, Daddy’s Girl was first released. As detailed here by her publisher Fantagraphics, “Fantagraphics Books is proud to re-release one of the most powerful and moving books in its distinguished publishing history: Debbie Drechsler’s first collection of short comic stories, Daddy’s Girl. Originally published in 1995 and distributed only to comic book specialty stores, Daddy’s Girl was ahead of its time: Drechsler’s account of her abuse at the hands of her father, told from the point of view of an adolescent, is one of the most searingly honest, empathetic, and profoundly disturbing uses of the comics medium in its history.” With some assistance from Fantagraphics’ Eric Reynolds and the valuable time and effort of Drechsler, I was recently able to email interview her about the re-release of the book, as well as what work she is currently pursuing.

Tim O’Shea: Given the personal, autobiographical nature of your work, do you intentionally avoid reading reviews of your work, or are you able to distinguish that folks are reviewing your storytelling skills, not your life?

Debbie Drechsler: No, I like to read reviews. I call my work autobiographical because there doesn’t seem to be another word that fits. But, really, it’s somewhere in between fact and fiction, I guess. The stories were very deliberately constructed, although I tried to maintain what I call the emotional truth of incest. They’re something I created, not a slice of my life.

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Music is a subject that captures my interest on a daily basis. The environment that sometimes fosters or inspires music or other creative projects is another aspect of pop culture that hold my attention quite easily. So when I found out about Michael Walker’s 2007 book, Laurel Canyon: The Inside Story of Rock-and-Roll’s Legendary Neighborhood, I knew I wanted to interview him about the book if possible. Fortunately it was quite possible. I’ll let Walker’s website describe his book and himself before launching into the interview:

“In the late sixties and early seventies, an impromptu collection of musicians colonized a eucalyptus-scented canyon deep in the Hollywood Hills of Los Angeles and melded folk, rock, and savvy American pop into a sound that conquered the world as thoroughly as the songs of the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. Thirty years later, the music made in Laurel Canyon continues to pour from radios, iPods, and concert stages around the world. During the canyon’s golden era, the musicians who lived and worked there scored dozens of landmark hits, from California Dreamin’ to Suite: Judy Blue Eyes to It’s Too Late, selling tens of millions of records and resetting the thermostat of pop culture.

In Laurel Canyon, journalist Michael Walker tells the inside story of this unprecedented gathering of some of the baby boom’s leading musical lights–including Joni Mitchell; Jim Morrison; Crosby, Stills & Nash; John Mayall; the Mamas and the Papas; Carole King; the Eagles; and Frank Zappa, to name just a few-who turned Los Angeles into the music capital of the world and forever changed the way popular music is recorded, marketed, and consumed. It was Brigadoon meets the Brill building, and the reverberations from the unprecedented music being made–and the sex, drugs, and rock and roll lifestyle it created –profoundly shaped the attitudes and expectations of an entire generation…

Michael Walker has written extensively about popular culture for The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post and other publications. He lives in Laurel Canyon.”

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Back in AP art during high school in the mid-1980s, I vividly remember dabbling in scratchboard (according to m-w.com “a black-surfaced cardboard having an undercoat of white clay on which an effect resembling engraving is achieved by scratching away portions of the surface to produce white lines”) and completely screwing it up. So the fact that Leah Hayes created Funeral of the Heart, a 120-page book drawn on scratchboard, caught my attention (and earned my unceasing respect) rather quickly. Thanks to some assistance from Fantagraphics’ Eric Reynolds, I was able to recently email interview Hayes. Here’s part of Fantagraphics description of the book: “Hayes creates a world of unease and ambiguity populated by obsessive characters, forlorn animals, and mysterious, inanimate objects; odd occurrences, unnerving deaths and unconventional but genuine love bind these characters and their stories together.” In addition to some sample pages, Fantagraphics set up a Flickr slideshow for the book and also offered a 10-page PDF preview. My thanks to Hayes for the interview, and please be sure to also check out her musical projects, Scary Mansion and La Laque.

Tim O’Shea: What made you decide to work with scratchboard for Funeral of the Heart?

Leah Hayes: It happened by accident. I was playing around with Scratchboard at the time that Fantagraphics talked to me about publishing a second book with them. I had written part of one story just for fun, so I decided to go with it.

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A major way that my son, Colin, and I have always bonded has been through music. So last year, when I discovered the podcast of Spare the Rock, Spoil the Child (a show from Valley Free Radio [103.3 FM, Northampton, Massachusetts]) both Colin and I were pretty darn happy. The show, recently also picked up by 93.9 The River, is hosted by Bill Childs along with Ella, his daughter, and (sometimes) Liam, his son. As detailed at the show’s MySpace page: “We play both music that’s officially for kids (e.g., Dan Zanes, Frances England, CandyBand, Lunch Money, Asylum Street Spankers) and a lot that’s not (e.g., Pixies, fIREHOSE, Beatles, Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings, and again the Spankers). And we start and end every darn show with They Might Be Giants [TMBG].” I recently caught up with Bill for an email interview.

Tim O’Shea: How did you first come up with the idea of Spare the Rock, and was it hard to get Ella to speak on air?

Bill Childs: We had moved to Northampton in the summer of 2004 for me to take a job teaching law school. At a local cafe, I came across a flyer for Valley Free Radio seeking programmers and people to help get the station started up. I had done radio in college (WMCN, 10 blazing watts of power) and was looking for a community-related activity, so I decided to apply for a show. I rapidly got involved on the policy side as well; I have dropped out of that role for the most part for quite a while, as there was some unpleasant infighting that seemed unproductive to me.

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Writer/artist Terry Moore is on a very short list of successful, long-term self-publishers. Last year, Moore wrapped up Strangers in Paradise, after a 14-year run. This month, he launched a brand new series, Echo, a bimonthly ongoing series about (at its core) “Julie Martin, a photographer taking pictures in the desert [who]… finds herself in the wrong place at the wrong time.” As if that is not enough, he is also writing two series for Marvel, Runaways and Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane. The bulk of this email interview focuses on Echo, understandably.

Tim O’Shea: More than a decade and a half ago was that last time you started self-publishing a comic book. On this go-round (in albeit a vastly different market) what are you doing different to make the book a better product (both for retailers and readers)? What logistical challenges are you dodging on this round?

Terry Moore: I’ve found I can’t work faster or slower anymore. Whether it’s a con sketch or a cover for the comic, I only have one speed because every drawing now has to be good. I’ve lived with deadlines so long they no longer scare me, I’m more interested in the final product, so the book will always be the best I can make it. I think that showed in the last couple of years of SiP and it shows in Echo. That’s the best thing I can do for my retailer partners, is make the best book I can and then go out and promote the hell out of it.

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A month or so ago, when I first contacted Joey Weiser, mainly it was to discuss his 2007 AdHouse book, The Ride Home. As with most good interviews, the email exchange took us in different interesting directions. Also as luck would have it, Weiser recently announced the release of his new collection, Tales of Unusual Circumstance, which is published by Author House and can be purchased here. Tales of Unusual Circumstance is a collection of work he’s done in mini-comics, anthologies or elsewhere over the past four years, as well as 48 pages of previously unreleased material. Here’s the core official line on the creator before we launch into the interview: “Joey Weiser was born on April 5, 1983, and has lived most of his life in Bloomington, Indiana. He is a graduate of the Savannah College of Art & Design (SCAD). Weiser’s comics have appeared in several anthologies, and his first graphic novel, The Ride Home, was published in 2007 by AdHouse Books.”

Tim O’Shea: For your first major project after earning your degree from SCAD, I’m wondering what made you opt for an all ages project like The Ride Home?

Joey Weiser: There wasn’t really a decision to make an all ages story. The Ride Home is just the kind of story that I write naturally. My older work was a bit more all over the place, but once I recognized that the kind of story that I enjoy creating is typically categorized as “all ages” it’s pretty easy to omit an occasional “Oh crap!” or whatever that might come through in a first draft that might keep it from being okay for everyone. But, honestly, I didn’t give it much thought.

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Washington Post’s Liz Clarke entered my area of knowledge in 2007 when hearing her as a cohort on Tony Kornheiser’s radio show. When Kornheiser returned to radio in January 2008, Clarke was back onboard with him as well, appearing on the show almost every Tuesday and Thursday. After hearing her briefly detail her new book, One Helluva Ride: How NASCAR Swept the Nation, I contacted Clarke to see if she’d like to discuss the book, as well as briefly talk about Mr. Tony (as regular listeners call him). Fortunately she was equally open to both topics.

Before starting the interview, here’s a bit of how the book is officially described: “… a full-throttle account of the rise and reign of NASCAR nation, is … Clarke’s chronicle of how stock car racing exploded from regional obsession to national phenomenon. “

Also, here is Clarke’s bio: “A sportswriter for The Washington Post, Liz Clarke has also covered NASCAR for USA Today, The Charlotte Observer, and The Dallas Morning News, and was twice honored with the Russ Catlin award for excellence in motorsports journalism. She spent four seasons as a Post beat writer on the Washington Redskins and has written extensively about the Olympics, tennis, and college sports. A graduate of Barnard College, she lives in Washington, D.C., with her beloved Lab, Rusty.”

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I first became aware of John Granger a few months ago, thanks to his friend and fellow educator, Amy H. Sturgis. Granger describes his most popular intellectual pursuit at his blog (HogwartsProfessor) as: “… Granger’s contribution to the crowded world of Harry Potter thinking is his insistence the books be read as any other very good book rather than a sui generis phenomenon. This perspective has allowed him to explain how the magic of the books is not a departure from the traditions of English fantasy and, mirabile dictu, is even edifying Christian reading.” Many of Granger’s books on Harry Potter (published by Zossima Press) can be found here. My thanks to Granger for taking the time for this email interview.

Tim O’Shea: As both a homeschooling and non-homeschooling educator yourself, how frustrating is it to read misinformed criticisms of Harry Potter by homeschooling parents threatened by the perceived dangers the works pose to their children.

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