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