Author Interviews

Author Interview and Giveaway: Kirk Scroggs – WE FOUND A MONSTER

By on January 13, 2021   /   Articles, Author Interviews  

Today, I am lucky enough to interview the multi-talented writer and artist Kirk Scroggs about his newest graphic novel,
WE FOUND A MONSTER.


Please tell us about your just-released book WE FOUND A MONSTER.

We Found a Monster is the story of a kid named Casey who has a few skeletons in his closet . . . and a She-Bat, and a zombie, some gremlins, a squid monster, and, oh yeah, Frankenstein’s in there too! Casey’s a loner who loves to draw monsters. About a year ago, shortly after his mom passed away, real monsters started showing up on his doorstep. Now he’s got a house full of them that he somehow has to keep hidden from his dad and the neighbors. He’s at his breaking point. He can’t possibly harbor one more critter. But there’s a new girl in town. Her name is Zandra and she needs Casey’s help. She’s found a monster too. A giant, furry, loveable behemoth named Spot. Spot needs a home but there are dangerous secrets lurking beneath his rainbow-colored fur. A dark past that has followed him to Casey’s sleepy little town. Someone, or some Thing, is after Spot. Casey will need Zandra’s help to protect Spot, but she is a bit of a mystery herself. Can she be trusted?

 

 

Casey’s Creature Exhibit showcases his monsters. Do you have a favorite?

It was a lot of fun mixing in some characters from DC’s vaults into this monster mash-up. She-Bat is a cool character. Half human half bat, she used to be a bat researcher before her body-altering accident. I think, for me, the favorite is an old classic- Frankenstein. Franky lives in Casey’s basement near the water heater and he’s got a few quirks. Since he was stitched together out of other classic monsters, he sports some interesting features, like an invisible arm and, when the moon is full, werewolf legs!

 

 

 

 

Casey is a bit of a monster purist – no Adorables and no Fantasticals. What about you? Do you think there’s a place for the fluffy and the fantastic?

Casey is definitely me when I was his age. I was strictly old school when it came to monsters. Dracula, Godzilla, the Wolfman. But, like Zandra in the story, I now appreciate fantasy creatures too and I’m willing to give them full monster status. I think watching the old Sinbad movies and embracing Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter has gradually opened my eyes. All monsters are cool! Even the adorables.

 

 

 

There’s so much happening on every page of WE FOUND A MONSTER. Could you tell our readers a little bit about how you go about creating a project like this? And, do you have any tips for budding graphic novelists?

With We Found A Monster, and The Secret Spiral of Swamp Kid, I definitely mashed a few art forms together—the graphic novel and the journal. It’s such a fun and freeform way to create a story. I like to sit with some plain white paper and just start scribbling and doodling, kind of like Casey does in the book. This journal format lets me experiment with different drawing tools and styles. If Casey is in a hurry, he just doodles out a quick black and white sketch. If he has the time, he pulls out the whole set of markers and draws a full-scale graphic novel sequence.

My advice to aspiring graphic novelists is to play to your strengths. If you’re better at drawing than writing, team up with your buddy who can’t draw so well but writes good stories. And vice versa. And remember to let the art do most of the hard work. No need to be overly descriptive when the art can convey the same information. And keep the dialogue short so it doesn’t block the cool pictures!

 

 

It’s pretty clear that you have a special affinity for monsters. Did you have a favorite when you were a kid? Do any of your childhood monster experiences come through in your stories?

I’ve always had a thing for the tragic monsters. Frankenstein, King Kong, Swamp Thing, Creature From the Black Lagoon—you kinda feel for these critters. They just want to be loved. I think everything I’ve ever written from Wiley and Grampa’s Creature Features to Swamp Kid, even the Muppet books, has woven in classic monster movie elements. I just can’t help it!


 

What can readers expect to see from you next?

There are certainly some follow-up ideas lurking in my head that I’d love to explore. Right now, I’m playing around with some animation proposals and I’m whipping up a top-secret graphic novel manuscript. I can’t say too much about it except robots, middle school, wolfpigs!

 

 

 

Thanks so much for chatting with us, Kirk. Readers, you can find WE FOUND A MONSTER at your favorite bookstores now. Be sure to follow Kirk at his website and on Twitter and Instagram.

 

If you love monsters as much as Kirk does, let us know your favorites in the comments below. And be sure to enter our Rafflecopter giveaway for a chance to win a copy of WE FOUND A MONSTER!

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OH MY GODS Middle Grade Graphic Series – Stephanie Cooke

By on January 6, 2021   /   Articles, Author Interviews  

Welcome 2021, and welcome Stephanie Cooke, co-author of Oh My Gods!, (HMH Kids/ETCH) the first in a new middle-grade graphic novel series. Stephanie stops by MUF to talk about the new book, her process with her collaborators, and what other artists and writers inspire her. PLUS we’ve got a free copy of Oh My Gods! to give away; enter at the bottom of the interview! 

Mixed Up Files: Stephanie, welcome to the blog, and can you give us a little bit of your background and how you found your way into the #kidlit world?

Stephanie Cooke: Absolutely! I’m a comic book writer and editor from Toronto, Canada and I’ve been telling stories for as long as I can remember. I love books in all mediums and eventually knew I wanted to try my hand at writing my own. I’ve felt that for a number of years that the kidlit market was seriously underserved in the comics industry and wanted to help change that. Both Oh My Gods! and ParaNorthern (out in July 2021) were originally pitched for a younger teen audience, but were picked up and aged down into the middle-grade market, and I have to say that I’m so glad they were. Writing for kids has truly been such a joy and allows me to have so much fun with the story, characters, and puns (which I love beyond all reason).

Oh My Gods! by Stephanie Cooke and Insha FitzpatrickMUF: Talk to us about your new graphic novel and how it came to be. You worked on this with other collaborators. Whose idea was it? And how did you all find each other to work on this together? Are you IRL friends/coworkers, or were you new to each other at the start of this?

SC: Oh My Gods! has been a passion project for a number of years now and came into existence during a conversation between Insha Fitzpatrick and myself. Insha and I have been friends for ages – we used to run an entertainment website together and also did a podcast! We were talking about Greek Mythology excitedly and then the start of Oh My Gods! started bubbling out of our talk, and before we knew it, we were putting together notes, story ideas, character concepts, and more into shared docs. We began refining the idea and narrowing things down, and realized that it wasn’t a concept that was going away…we had to work on this! So we kept at, until it was ready for an artist.

I was hiring an artist for a short story on a completely different project and Juliana Moon sent in her portfolio to us. She wasn’t the right fit for the project I had been scouting for but I could see so much potential in her character designs in how expressive they were and how much fun she clearly had with her art. I showed her art to Insha and she loved it! We had a conversation with Juliana, and that was that. We’ve been a team ever since, but it’s truly hard to imagine a time when Juliana wasn’t there; we all get along amazingly and have the same energy that always hypes each of us up. Whitney Cogar came on board via HMH / Etch to do the colours for the story, and we’ve absolutely adored what she’s brought to the book!

MUF: What was the process like working on this? Can you explain a bit about the actual nuts and bolts of writing and illustrating? And how long from “let’s do this!” to pub date was your journey?

SC: Creating a comic book is such a fun experience. The collaboration makes it a truly unique and fantastic storytelling medium! For the writing portion of things, Insha and I spent a lot of time building up a really detailed outline together that was essentially a bullet-point version of the story. We collaborate on that until we’re happy, and then I go in and create a loose script based off of what we created (which includes the art direction for Juliana as well as placeholder dialogue). Insha refined characters and really fleshed them out, making them feel as real as we possibly could (seriously…she made them all Spotify playlists, Pinterest mood boards, and more!)

Once we’re ready to move forward with the characters and the script, we go through it and refine it. Insha is amazing with dialogue for that younger audience so she’d go in and adjust things and help it feel more unique and fitting for each character. We refined, refined, refined until we had a story that we were happy with!

Then it goes off to Juliana for the art. There’s a few different stages for that process where you have to submit thumbnails (rough art for the pages), pencils/inks (more refined art), and the final black and white line art which then goes over to Whitney to be coloured. Then of course, we have to add in the dialogue and captions which is handled by our book designer, Andrea Miller.

It’s hard to say how long it all took. We initially were going to pitch to comic book publishers to release the book in a serialized monthly format, and then I had another book picked up by HMH Kids (and my wonderful editor Lily) called ParaNorthern (which is out July 2021). That was actually the first graphic novel that I sold! I worked on that for a while, finished up writing duties on it, and then HMH asked for more of my work. We presented them with Oh My Gods! which they loved and fast-tracked for publication. So realistically from inception to publication, the turnaround specifically for Oh My Gods! was probably 4+ years!

Stephanie Cooke, author

Stephanie Cooke, author.
Photo: Tyra Sweet

MUF: How many books in the series can readers look forward to?

SC: So far we have two books coming out in the series! Insha, Juliana, and I have so many more ideas that we would love to write though, so we’re really hoping that we get an opportunity to explore those. Greek Mythology has so many interesting figures and stories, and we really want to play in that sandbox more!

MUF: Your publisher says that the book “reads as if Raina Telgemeier and Rick Riordan teamed up to write a comic.” Are you fans of those two creators? Who else inspires your work?  

SC: I am absolutely a fan of them both. I’ve admittedly not read the Percy Jackson books, which might be blasphemy as a big Greek Mythology fan but I have seen the Broadway play! Not that that’s the same, but I have huge respect for the franchise Riordan has built and the way he’s integrating other writers and mythology into it. That’s the dream, really! I would love to have this take off in a way that we can bring in other creators to the table to share their voices and stories. And being compared to Raina Telgemeier is beyond intimidating! I’m in awe of the career she’s built for herself and firmly believe she’s one of the best creators out there. The way she integrates feelings and real-life scenarios that kids may not know how to cope with otherwise while also telling an extraordinary story? She’s a master at what she does.

I think another inspiration would be Noelle Stevenson too. I love her sense of humour and her style; Nimona and Lumberjanes are absolute favourites for me! And then specifically for Oh My Gods!, I think that the TV show Clone High was a huge inspiration. That was done by Phil Lord, Chris Miller, and Bill Lawrence; Lord went on to write Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse as well as The LEGO Movie, which both have so much heart, wit, and cleverness imbued in them.

MUF: Can you suggest a few other new(ish) middle grade graphic novels you think readers might enjoy reading?

SC: YES!!! I live for recommendations. These are some of my faves that I’ve enjoyed over the last little bit:

ANNNND, this is a completely selfish recommendation but please also check out my upcoming graphic novel ParaNorthern which is out on July 6, 2021 with art by Mari Costa.

MUF: And since MUF is all about middle grade books, what made you decide to make your book a MG one, vs. say, for younger, early chapter reader kids or older, YA readers? What is it about this age reader that you felt fit best with your ideas and story?

SC: I think I jumped the gun a bit by mentioning this a tad earlier but initially we had pitched Oh My Gods! as a book for a slightly older audience and then we aged it down to middle-grade, and I’m so glad we did!

I just finished writing my first YA graphic novel and while I love it so much (I love all my book children!!) it’s very different to write for that audience, and I’m so happy we made Oh My Gods! for a younger audience. You’re able to include a lot more silliness with that audience, and it really does feel like the best extension of who we are as a team! We put so much of ourselves into the characters and story and this (to me) feels like a great representation of us.

MUF: How do we find you online? List any website/social media URLs you’d like us to share.  

You can find me online at stephaniecooke.ca as well as on Twitter and Instagram @hellocookie.

Enter the giveaway here! 

 

 

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Interview with Anne O’Brien Carelli on Brave Girls in History + Giveaway

By on December 21, 2020   /   Author Interviews  

I’m thrilled to share an interview with the fantastic middle-grade author Anne O’Brien Carelli. Anne’s debut novel, SKYLARK AND WALLCREEPER, came out the same year as my debut novel, THE BOY, THE BOAT, AND THE BEAST, and I fell in love with the book’s characters. In the book, Anne brilliantly parallels the story of a girl helping the resistance during World War II and a girl trying to help her grandmother during Hurricane Sandy in New York. Anne has continued to write books about young girls in historical times, with two more released this year, ONE LIGHT and BENEATH THE HEART. I asked Anne about her new books and her writing choices.

Hey Anne! Welcome to From the Mixed Up Files.

Skylark and Wallcreeper by Anne O'Brien CarelliYou once told me that your brand has become “brave girls in danger (and spying!)” and that’s so true! What draws you to writing historical MG fiction and especially these types of stories with spying and brave girls?

Thank you, Samantha. I had not intended for that to be my brand, but it appears that I tend to write about courageous girls who are in the midst of challenging historical events like the French Resistance or the Revolutionary War. I have always loved history and have had a lifelong fascination with the WWII Resistance, plus my favorite museum is the International Spy Museum, so I guess it was inevitable that I write about those things!

ONE LIGHT and SKYLARK AND WALLCREEPER are set during WWII and your latest novel, BENEATH THE HEART, is set during the Revolutionary War. Why did you choose these wars to be the backdrop for these stories?

SKYLARK AND WALLCREEPER is about a girl who is helping to evacuate her grandmother during Hurricane Sandy in New York City and discovers that her granny was a spy in WWII. The story came from a conversation with a nurse who was responsible for relocating 400 elderly residents during the hurricane. I combined that event with the French Resistance in a story that goes back and forth between 2011 and 1945. ONE LIGHT is a companion Resistance novel with a young girl who helps Jewish refugee children who are hiding in the cellar of a monastery. All of these stories are based on the actual involvement of children in the Resistance. I don’t think kids get enough credit for how brave they can be!

BENEATH THE HEARTOne Light by Anne O'Brien Carelli came from the amazing discovery that my ancestors owned the house and barn that were used as the American headquarters on the Saratoga battlefield during the Revolutionary War. That fact is especially remarkable because I’m originally from Michigan and moved to the Saratoga area before I knew of my family history! When I walked that land, I wondered what it would be like to be a twelve-year-old girl living in that house, and a story was born.

These books must need a lot of research. What’s your biggest tip on researching?

Primary sources are the best, and fascinating to read. I always try to dig out journals, patents, newspapers, maps, and other publications of the time period. Plenty of them are online now, but museum curators, reference librarians, and college professors are always happy to help you do some digging. (But be careful not to exclaim, “Wow!” when you discover something surprising while conducting research in a quiet library.) My favorite “deep dive” was when a curator and I unearthed the black lace coat of the suffragist Susan B. Anthony in the Seneca Falls Historical Society attic. Very cool.

Historical fiction has its own challenges in that you’re still fictionalizing real historical events. How do you figure out what kind of fictional story you want to layer over the real history?

My stories are always based on historical facts, including references to clothing, transportation, language, food, and other details. I like to put children in the middle of historical events and provide them with problems to solve. Since I rarely outline my books in advance, my characters generally take over the story and off we go!

Beneath the Heart by Anne O'Brien CarelliSKYLARK AND WALLCREEPER, your debut novel, was published in 2018 through Little Bee Book’s Yellow Jacket imprint. For your next two novels, you chose to self-publish. Could you tell us about that decision and the differences between the two?

This was a big decision and the pandemic clinched it. I had worked with traditional publishers when I was writing nonfiction for adults but entered the world of children’s literature at a late age. I was thrilled when Little Bee published SKYLARK, but the publishing world operates at a slow pace and I’m not a spring chicken, so after a long discussion with my wonderful, supportive agent I decided to publish books myself. It has been challenging to handle the details and marketing, but I love the freedom of publishing according to my schedule. I could never have pursued this route if I hadn’t met so many incredible writers, teachers, librarians, and readers when I first started this journey.

I know you’re always working on a number of projects. What can we look forward to seeing from you next?

I just finished THE SKELETON’S GOLD, which is a story told by a fourteen-year-old boy in the Civil War. It’s based on a little-known robbery in 1864 and it was so much fun to write! It will be released in the spring of 2021. (There are brave girls in that one, too.) A new middle grade book that is about two friends who bond over experiences with the tragedy of September 11th and a refugee’s journey, will be published after that. A lot of the story is based on personal experience and my years of working with refugee children. And there are many other works in progress!

These sound wonderful. Thank you, Anne!

Check out Anne O’Brien Carelli’s books on her website, and click the links in this interview purchase copies. Plus, make sure you enter the giveaway below for your chance to win a paperback copy of ONE LIGHT and BENEATH THE HEART. Ends Dec. 31. U.S. and Canada only.

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