Graphic Novel TK

2020 and 2021 have been a very strange time in publishing -- a time when the way that publishing a book works has changed rapidly and in unexpected ways. At the start of 2020, the expectation was the year would proceed as usual -- and then only months later, as covid spread, authors and publishers scrambled to adjust plans as everything that would've been in-person shut down. In this interview, we talked to Shannon Wright about her experience with publishing a book during covid. Shannon's first graphic novel, Twins, came out in October 2020, and she and her publisher, Scholastic Graphix were changing and adjusting plans and processes as 2020 unfolded. Interested in finding out more about Shannon Wright? You can check out her website (https://shannon-wright.com/) and follow her on Twitter (https://twitter.com/shannondrewthis)

So your book has been published! It is now in out in the world for everyone to read. And now . . . what happens? Do people mostly come to find your book organically? How do you make sure people are still reading your book in a year . . . and what can you do to make sure that they're still reading your book in five years? We talk to Julia Pohl-Miranda, Director of Marketing at renowned Canadian comics publisher Drawn and Quarterly, about the long-term view on publishing graphic novels. Interested in learning more about Drawn and Quarterly and Julia Pohl-Miranda? You can check out D&Q's website ( https://drawnandquarterly.com ) or find them on Twitter ( https://twitter.com/DandQ ) (We note that we recorded this episode in 2019, so the discussion and advice here is sometimes not representative of the state of the world in 2020/2021. For more on that . . . more TK.)

Your publisher has called you to tell you that your book has a publication date! It's coming out! In the future! What . . . do you do in the meantime? You want everyone you know -- and also everyone you don't know -- to be the most excited and to buy your book when it appears in stores. How do you work with your publisher to make that happen? What does your publisher want you to do? What does your publisher want you NOT to do? Today we talk about all these questions with Jacq Cohen, the Executive Director of Marketing, Publicity, and Promotions at Fantagraphics (which basically means that her job is to work with authors to plan and execute the best strategy for getting people excited about their graphic novels). Interested in learning more about Jacq Cohen and Fantagraphics? You can find her on Twitter (https://twitter.com/jacq_cohen) and also Fantagraphics (https://www.fantagraphics.com). (We note that we recorded this episode in 2019, so the discussion and advice here is sometimes not representative of the state of the world in 2020/2021. For more on that . . . more TK.)

Publishers! If you've got one, they're involved in all the parts of making a book -- from negotiating a book deal to contracts, editing, design, marketing, publicity, sales, and all the bits where you work to get the book out to readers. How do you make sure that your relationship with your publisher goes well -- and that they're on the same page about what you want to happen with your book that you are? Today we talk to Dwayne McDuffie Award-winning comics creator Nilah Magruder about just that! Having done picture books, chapter book illustration, cover illustration, and graphic novels, Nilah brings her expertise from various publishers (and lots of different kinds of work) to the discussion. Interested in learning more about Nilah Magruder? You can find her on her website (http://www.nilahmagruder.com/) or on Twitter at @nilaffle (https://twitter.com/nilaffle).

Headlines! Radio segments! Feature pieces! Your comic might be in one of those spaces one day. But . . . how? Today we're talking to Petra Mayer, the editor at NPR Books, about consumer-facing media outlets. What do they do? How do you work with them? And how much are national media outlets interested in comics and graphic novels? For more about Petra, you can follow her on Twitter (https://twitter.com/petramatic) -- and NPR Books has a website (https://www.npr.org/books/) and a Twitter (https://twitter.com/nprbooks) also.

Conferences, conventions, and festivals! As a comics creator, should you go to them? What should you do there? What's the best way for you to work with all the very different public event spaces there are to promote and support your comics and your career? Today, we talk to the co-founder and Artistic Director of the Toronto Comics Art Festival, Christopher Butcher, about how conferences, conventions, and festivals work, and how best to plan to interact with them as an author. For more information about the Toronto Comics Art Festival, you can check them out on Twitter (https://twitter.com/torontocomics) or at their website (http://www.torontocomics.com). For more on Christopher Butcher, you can follow him on Twitter (https://twitter.com/Comics212).

Social media! Authors are there, talking about themselves and their books, all the time. What goes into thinking about how to do that in a successful way and manageable way? That's what we explore in this episode of Graphic Novel TK. We're delighted to be discussing the ins and outs of having an online presence with Ngozi Ukazu, the author of webcomic sensation Check, Please! Want to learn more about Ngozi Ukazu? You can find her on Twitter ( https://twitter.com/ngoziu ) or on her website ( https://www.ngoziu.com/ )

We interrupt our regular arc of Graphic Novel TK posting to bring you a new feature: Graphic Novel TK Backmatter. Where Graphic Novel TK follows a book through its publication life from book deal to post-publication, Graphic Novel TK Backmatter focuses on specific topics in comics publishing. We'll be sporadically bringing you featured episodes on these special topics in the months to come. Some comics are short -- like mini-comics, contributions to anthologies, and some webcomics. And other comics are much, much, much longer -- like graphic novels. How does a cartoonist transition from doing shorter work to doing longer? What are the differences -- both on the creative side and on the process side? In this episode, we talk to comics creator Sarah Winifred Searle -- who has done a lot of work on both ends of the spectrum of comics length -- about her methods for creating comics and organizing herself while doing so. GN TK's 'Short Form to Long Form' episode is also our first-ever live episode! Thanks to TCAF for giving us the venue to host Sarah Winifred Searle for this conversation. You can find Sarah Winifred Searle on her website ( http://www.swinsea.com ), or on Twitter (http://twitter.com/swinsea)

On the last few episodes of Graphic Novel TK, we've been talking to booksellers, comic book sellers, teachers, and librarians about how they work with graphic novels in their spaces. But how do those industry professionals hear about graphic novels? How do they know what to buy, what to get excited about, or even what's coming soon? One of the first ways that an industry professional might hear about graphic novels is through a trade publication -- a publication that is specifically designed to reach the industry, rather than the public. Today we talk to Calvin Reid, the Senior News Editor of trade publication Publishers Weekly, about the ins and outs of trade media. For more about Calvin Reid, you can follow him on Twitter (https://twitter.com/calreid); or check out Publishers Weekly (https://www.publishersweekly.com) which has many enewsletters you can subscribe to, including a comics one.

Comics can help young kids learn! But what about after those kids go to college? How are comics used in an academic space? Today we're delighted to talk to Professor Margaret Galvan, from the University of Florida, to explore college courses, academic research, and how comics and graphic novels enter into and interact with students and teachers in these classrooms. Want to know more about Margaret Galvan? You can find more about her and her academic work on her website, including some fantastic comics network charts (http://margaretgalvan.org) or follow her on Twitter @Magdor.

More and move all over America, comics are being used in schools -- in classes, in school libraries, in book reports and reading requirements. How are teachers working to bring comics into their classrooms? We talk to educator and graphic novelist Cathy G. Johnson about her work teaching comics to elementary, middle, and secondary school kids and teens in this episode. Want to know more about Cathy G. Johnson? You can find her on Twitter at @cathygjohn (https://twitter.com/cathygjohn) or at her website (https://www.cathygjohn.net). She also has a website entirely dedicated to her work in education, Comics Art Ed! (https://comicarted.com/) as well as a podcast about comics and education, Drawing a Dialogue (https://comicarted.com/drawing-a-dialogue/).

Libraries! They're in every town in the United States -- and many of them have comics and graphic novels in them. How did that state of affairs come to pass? And how do librarians support graphic novels, both with buying them and adding them to their collections, and with promoting them to their patrons? In this episode, we talk with Robin Brenner, Teen Librarian at the Public Library of Brookline -- and one of the first librarians to begin advocating for comics in libraries in the US -- about the ins and outs of comics librarianship. Want to know more about Robin Brenner? She runs the graphic novel reviews website No Flying, No Tights (https://www.noflyingnotights.com) and is on the board of the ALA Graphic Novel and Comics Roundtable (http://www.ala.org/rt/gncrt)

Distribution! What stores is your graphic novel in, and where is it displayed? Is it reaching the school and library market? Is it featured in museum stores and gift shops? Those questions are in part answered by what kind of graphic novel you've created, and what kind of critical acclaim it's receiving. But there's another major factor that goes into the mix, and that's distribution. Major publishers have their own distribution; smaller publishers will work with a larger distribution to make sure that their graphic novels are in as many of the appropriate places as possible. What goes into making that happen? We talk today to Julie Schaper, the publisher of Consortium Book Sales & Distribution, an independent distributor that works with multiple graphic novel publishers. She discusses her career in sales and distribution, and talks about Consortium's process for getting books out there. Want to learn more about Consortium? You can check out their website (which includes their extensive client list)at https://www.cbsd.com -- and follow them on Twitter https://twitter.com/ConsortiumBooks

One of the jobs most shrouded in mystery at a publisher (at least for an author) is that of a sales rep. Who are they? What do they do? Despite the fact that editors, marketing, and publicity people spend a lot of time talking to sales reps, often those reps don't interact at all with authors directly. Sales reps are responsible for being the intermediary between the publisher and the retail outlets the publisher sells books to. They're responsible for making sure that stores know that books are coming, when they're coming, and how excited that they should be about them. Today on Graphic Novel TK, we talk to Macmillan Children's National Accounts Manager Jess Brigman about all of those things -- and get a behind-the-scenes look into how she does her job. Want to know more about Jess and Macmillan Children's? You can find MacKids online at their website (https://us.macmillan.com/mackids/); Jess is on Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/jessbrigman/)

We've talked about bookstores and comics stores before on Graphic Novel TK -- in fact, in our two episodes immediately prior to this! But how are bookstores and comics stores different? Are all their differences encompassed by the fact that one has books and comics and the other just comics? Or are there things that are different about the way they're structured and the way they operate? We talked today to Jake Shapiro, who has worked at both NYC's The Strand and DC's Fantom Comics, about what exactly goes on behind the scenes in bookstores and comics stores. How are the comics organized? How are displays made? How do they attract people in the door? How do events get put together? How do they do social media? You can find all the answers in this episode. You can find more about The Strand (https://www.strandbooks.com) and about Fantom Comics (https://www.fantomcomics.com) at the links. And Jake is on Twitter as @jake_shapiro

Bookstores! They're so full of . . . books. But what about comics? What's their place there? How can people who make comics work to try to find their work a home in a physical space that mostly reaches book readers? What is the audience like? Today we talk to Greenlight Bookstore co-owner Jessica Stockton Bagnulo about how she thinks about comics in bookstores, and how she and her staff to feature authors and books that they like. How big a part of her job is comics-related? Listen to find out! Want to know more about Greenlight Bookstore? You can find them online at their website (https://www.greenlightbookstore.com) or on Twitter at @greenlightbklyn. Or visit them in Brooklyn in one of their two locations!

You're going to be an author! But how do you get your books to actually sell? After you've told your friends and family that your book exists, you still have to convince the rest of the people in the world that they should buy it. And your best allies on that front can be bookstores and comics stores, who spend all day every day talking to people about how they should buy graphic novels from them.  Today, we talk to the co-owners of Eisner Award-winning comics store Challengers Comics + Conversation, in Chicago IL, about what comics stores do, how they work, and how authors can work with them.  Author events, staff features, building relationships, newsletter promotion -- Patrick Brower and W. Dal Bush talk about how it all unfolds in their store.  You can visit Challengers Comics + Conversation yourself -- or check them out on Twitter at @challengers -- or listen to their podcast about retailing, Contest of Challengers.

Media! Reviews! It's amazing when you make a book, and then people start talking about it -- online, in print, on the radio, and sometimes even on television. It can seem like that happens spontaneously -- a book gathering praise like a snowball rolling down a hill and accumulating snow -- and that can sometimes be the case. But there's also someone whose job it is to build that snowball and give it a push: a publicist. Today we talk to the woman who coordinates the publicity for Abrams ComicArts, Maya Bradford, about what being a publicist is, how it works, and what authors should know about publicity. For more about the books Maya works on, check out the Abrams ComicArts website - https://www.abramsbooks.com/imprints/abramscomicarts/

Marketing is making sure that the people who would be excited for a particular book know about it, and about how great it is. How does a publisher makes sure that happens? Generally they employ someone whose job is to figure it out. Today we talk to Tucker Stone all about marketing. Until recently, Tucker ran the marketing, publicity, and sales at Nobrow, and now he works for the books and comics distributor Consortium. In today's episode, we discuss his experiences with how to get books out into the world for readers -- and what things are useful for authors to do. For more about Tucker Stone and Consortium Books, you check out his website (https://www.factualopinion.com) or Consortium's (https://www.cbsd.com)

Your editor will edit your book! But what else does an editor at a publishing house do? They're the first person at a publishing house to get excited about a book and how amazing it is. How do they work with all the rest of the people at the publishing house -- their boss, the other editorial and design staff, and the marketing, publicity, and sales staff -- to make sure that everyone realizes just how great a book they have on their hands? How much of their job is managing that conversation -- what's involved, and when does it happen? And how important is it for editors to be on top of what other people at the company are planning with the books they work on? To learn more about how editors advocate for their books with other people at their publishing house, we talk to Connie Hsu, the Executive Editor at Roaring Brook Press. In addition to working at Roaring Brook Press, Connie also edits graphic novels for Roaring Brook's sister company, First Second Books, where she works with many graphic novelists, including Tillie Walden, Jason Walz, Marcus Emerson, Dan Santat, and Shannon Hale and LeUyen Pham. Want to know more about Connie Hsu? You can follow her on Twitter at @MissConnieH

Paper + ink = book! But how does that paper combine with the ink to make a book? What dread machine combines the two -- and how does it get them to look like a comic in all the right colors in the correct trim size and with a cover that has spot gloss in the right place? Today we take a trip inside the printer to find out the answer to all these questions (and so many more). Joining us on Graphic Novel TK to explore these mysteries is Linda Palladino, the Vice President and Director of Production at Random House Children's Books. For more information about Linda Palladino and the books she works on, you can check out the Random House Children's Books website.

Sometimes when you pick up a book, you'll find a quote from an author (not the one who wrote the book) on the cover saying how great they thought the book was. That's a book blurb! And in this episode of Graphic Novel TK, book blurbs are the focus: we talk about how to get them, who to get them from, when to get them, and why (and if) they're important. We're so pleased to have Tor Editor Diana Pho join us to talk about book blurbs, outlining in great detail her whole process and philosophy in finding and acquiring them. Besides editing science fiction, fantasy, and graphic novels for Tor, Diana also runs a blog called Beyond Victoriana, which gives a multicultural perspective on steampunk. You can find her on Twitter at @writersyndrome.

Making comics full time is the dream for a lot of people in the comics industry! But what does being a full-time cartoonist mean practically? What do you do every day? And can you make enough to live on? We're excited to talk to Jen Wang, the creator of the graphic novels Koko Be Good, In Real Life, and The Prince and the Dressmaker, about exactly those things (and all the questions in between). And in addition to her graphic novel work, Jen also does freelance illustration and co-founded and co-runs Comics Arts LA -- she has a unique perspective on the industry. Find more about Jen and her work online at http://www.jenwang.net/ or on Twitter at @alooghobi.

Can you judge a book by its cover? That's what cover designers aim for -- creating a cover so amazing that the people who would want to read the book are drawn to pick it up. And covers are probably the most-seen parts of books -- the book's visual identity. Today, we talk to Colleen AF Venable, Art Director at Odd Dot, about why cover design is important, and about how the process works for her and for the author (which as an author herself, she has a lot of experience with). Find out more about Colleen online (and share in some of her cover design adventures) on Twitter at @colleenaf

How do books get made? You might think that's a comprehensive statement about the theme of our podcast -- but for this episode, we're focusing specifically on how physical books actually get made: the process of working with a printer to produce physical book objects. Turns out: it's fascinating! And also complicated. Today we talk to First Second's Production Manager, Alexa Villanueva, about how she works with the team at First Second and the printer and a shipping company and a warehouse and a whole lot of other people to get books to turn from files to physical things on bookshelves. So how does that all happen? Tune in to find out! Want to see more of Alexa's work at First Second? You can always find pictures of their books on the First Second twitter, @01FirstSecond.

Comics and graphic novel publishing! It can be a strange and confusing landscape if you're not someone who has spent a lot of time working closely with the industry. (It can be a strange and confusing landscape even then!) For this episode, we asked GN TK listeners to send us any questions that you have about how publishing works -- anything that we haven't covered yet or is particularly topical, involved, or that we didn't get into enough depth about when we talked about it previously. So tune in for all the crazy things about publishing that you all wanted to know! This podcast is structured to approach the publishing process chronologically -- from pitching to editing to design to marketing to sales. So there are many more topics to come in the future that we'll be getting to soon. As always -- more TK! Thank you to all our listeners who follow us on Twitter who sent questions -- we appreciate it.

Designers have one of the most visible jobs in comics -- someone puts the covers and the page layouts and the lettering and the page numbers and the files from the artist and the colorist all together on the page, right? But how does a designer's job work? What do they do on a day-to-day basis? In this episode, we talk to Hilary Thompson from Oni Press about all of these things. Hilary takes us through the process and timeline of creating graphic novels and pamphlet comics at Oni -- and we're excited to share this look behind the scenes. For more information about Hilary, you can check out her @hilaryfamiliar -- or check out Oni Press online at https://onipress.com

There are a number of jobs in publishing that happen behind the scenes -- and one of them is the Managing Editor. In this episode, we talk to Jill Freshney about what's involved in being a Managing Editor (spoiler: it includes scheduling, data management, copy-editing, and a whole lot of other administrative management and process development/maintenance). Jill shares some information about how authors and Managing Editorial staff interact, how to deal with copy-edit changes, and thoughts on how to pursue a career in Managing Editorial. We're excited to share this look behind the scenes! Jill Freshney is the Senior Executive Managing Editor at Macmillan Children's Publishing Group -- a company that includes the graphic novel publisher First Second Books.

So you're making your graphic novel -- and you're coming to the end. The final page/final panel is in sight. Yay! It is an exciting milestone you are approaching: soon you will be entirely done with your book. But is that really the end? When you put your pen down after inking that last panel, are you done with the process of making a graphic novel? Is there more to do after that? To answer those questions, we talk with best-selling, award-winning author Jenni Holm about what happens around when you're done with the creative part of making your graphic novel. (It turns out that there's still some stuff left to do.) For more about Jenni Holm, you can check out her website: http://www.jenniferholm.com/. Or find her on Twitter @jenniholm!

You've got a book deal! Or a self-publishing plan! A graphic novel is your next project. Yay you! But how do you go from a book deal, or a plot idea, to a final finished book? What does your day-to-day work look like? How do you plan for the process that takes you from the blank paged to a comic? In this episode, we talk to Carey Pietsch about the creative and logistical process she embarks upon when she's creating a comics project. From scheduling to strategy, she has some amazing advice! For more about Carey, you can check out her website, www.careydraws.com, or find her on Twitter at @careydraws.

So you've got a book deal! And an agent, and an editor, and a publisher -- you're doing amazing.  Or you've got a pitch that you're just finishing up, and you're ready to start the process of finding all of those people to work with you, people you hope you'll work with your whole career. Or you've got a book! Or a webcomic! Or a mini-comic! And you're ready to start that Twitter account, go to a comics festival, put yourself out there and make the connections to build your career. How do you go from being a private person to having a professional public presence, in person at meetings, talking on email, calling people on the phone, interacting online, and in public at conventions? What does it mean to be professional? And how do you determine what the right amount of professionalism in each situation is? Basically the secret answer to this is that we all make it up as we go along, but we try to be nice and considerate and thoughtful and think twice about all our actions while we're proceeding. And today we talk to amazing cartoonist Lucy Knisley about how she thinks about professionalism, both now and when she was just starting out with her career. You can find information about all of Lucy's amazing graphic novels and other things at her website, http://www.lucyknisley.com/.

In our last episode we talked all about contracts -- what part of the creative process you get one in and how to look at them to figure out if you have a deal that you want. In this episode, we talk about rights -- both how they work in contracts themselves, and what a publisher does with the rights that you sign over to them after you finalize your contract. We're excited to talk to Miriam Miller from the publisher Holiday House about being a Subsidiary Rights Manager, what that job is like, and what's involved in selling rights for things like translation and media (like selling a book -- often only the beginning of the process).

It's contracts time! But what does that mean? What's involved in the process of coming to an agreement with a publisher? What more should you be looking at than the dollar amount you're offered? In this episode, we talk with lawyer and contracts expert Katie Lane, from Work Made for Hire, about the ins and outs of the contract process -- from the moment of getting a book offer through to dealing with any problems you might have fulfilling things you agreed on in your contract. Want to know even more about contracts after listening to this episode? (Of course you do.) Katie has you covered! Here's a series of emails she provides about the basics of contracts demystification: bit.ly/understandcontracts.

What happens once an editor at a publishing house has a book on submission that they want to buy? What are the steps that they need to take between that and making an offer? At many publishing houses, the procedure is to present the book at an Acquisition Meeting -- a meeting with a lot of different people from the publisher so they can all put their heads together and figure out if the book will work for the publishing house. Today, we take an extensive look into this infrequently-discussed part of the publishing process with Andrew Eliopulos, a Senior Editor from Harper Collins Children's Books. Who comes to these meetings? How hard is it to get them to get excited about comics? What sort of things do make people at these meetings enthusiastic about graphic novels? Listen on and find out!

How do you get from a proposal to a book deal? What do you need for a proposal? What's the process of talking to agents and publishers to get a contract? Today, we talk to Jen Linnan at Linnan Literary Management about all of these questions -- and more! As an agent who runs her own agency and deals exclusively with comics, Jen has the inside scoop.

In this episode of Graphic Novel TK, we're delighted to talk to the amazing Annie Koyama, the publisher of Koyama Press. If you don't know Koyama Press, you'll get to hear about just how cool they (and their publisher) are as you listen. And if you've always been a little bit mystified about what a publisher actually does, this is the episode for you! You'll get to hear about Annie Koyama's process of becoming a publisher, what she does in her day-to-day job, and more.

This week! Agents -- who are they? What do they do? What are their jobs like, and how helpful is it for authors and artists to work with them? We talk with Bernadette Baker-Baughman from Victoria Sanders & Associates about the ins and outs of her work representing cartoonists.

From an Idea to a Pitch for a Publisher So you have an idea for a graphic novel! That’s great. But when is it time to pitch that idea to a publisher? Right away? When you have concept art? When you have a full script? When you’ve written and drawn the whole story? When you’ve serialized your comic online and built up a following? Figuring out the best route to publication can be complicated! We talk to First Second Editorial Director Calista Brill about how she thinks about book pitches when she’s looking for new projects for :01. Happy listening! Find Calista Brill online at @CalistaBrill and her books @01FirstSecond.

What do all of these publishing words mean? This week we’re bringing you part two of our conversation with long-time comics professional George Rohac about the wild world of publishing terminology. In this half, we cover everything from ARCs to ISBNs to paper stock to options to what exactly an indicia is. Our lingo rundown builds on itself, so maybe give part one a listen before you move on to this installment. You can find out more about George’s work at grohac.com, or follow George on Twitter @grohac

Words! As comics people, we all love them — but there are so many mysterious terms in publishing that it sometimes makes your head spin. In this episode (the first of a two-parter), we decode publishing’s secret terminology, with amazing manager and long-time comics professional George Rohac. Lucky for us, George is just as much of a nerd about this stuff as we are.

In the debut episode of GNTK we talk about why we’re all so fired up to explain the nuts and bolts of graphic novel publishing -- with guest bestselling author Ryan North, who talks about how he got his start in comics, what he’s learned since, and how understanding the inner workings of the business can help your career.