About making a graphic novel

One could easily wonder how this person finished writing and drawing a graphic novel and not even miss the deadline. But I did it! My second book will come out on June 12th!

In English that would be:

The Flying Climate Activist

How striving to live more sustainably has offered me a sense of freedom.

The book now comes out in dutch, but you can read parts of it in English, because it all began with bits here on Substack. This is the first of a string of posts:

Who wants to be THAT person?

I started posting here, thinking I would just write and illustrate the book on the fly. Then I got stuck, stopped, went back after a while, pieced it together with a bunch of sticky notes, pitched it to a publisher, reworked it again, sketched it all and finally injured my arm drawing and coloring the whole thing. If you look at the cover, you might recognize an idea

Gillian & Li'l Bean

and I posted about six months ago. What we did together back then felt completely separate from the book bits, but miraculously now feels like it always belonged together.

Then I spoke to

Dave Cowen

of

SerioComics

and he said something that really resonated with me, as this is my experience as well:

I think my advice to anyone who is considering writing a book, particularly about a sensitive topic, would be to take a lot of time. Or take your time. You sometimes have to mature into an issue. A lot of things can be written fast. And sometimes art that is spontaneous is perfect for being so. But often with a sensitive issue, it seems from my experience, you really don't know what you don't know, until you work your way through it, many times over.

I asked him a couple more questions about his graphic novel:

I saw that you've been working on this book for 11 years! Can you share a bit about the process? Did your opinion about gun ownership change during the making of this book?

Yes, 11 years! Something I haven't talked about yet is that there is an intergenerational trauma incident that may have guided me to want to make this book. My great-grandfather was shot and killed by his brother. My grandfather never really talked about this incident. It was only when I was years into working on this book that I learned about this family trauma. But somehow I can't help but think that this story is a way of healing that story.

In terms of what I read and listened to and how I gathered information, that was an extensive process. In the early years it was a lot of New Yorker and Atlantic articles and books such as by sociologist Jennifer Carlson... Later it was also exposure to ideology from the other side of things, such as Dan Bongino's NRA tv show and practical experience such as taking a gun course with LA Progressive Shooters. My opinions about gun ownership did change, and that was one of the biggest reasons it took so long to make this book. I started as a pacifist and now I at least am not so sure about that perspective. In a more immediate way that's how this book started; a partner at the time was shocked when I said I didn't know if I could kill someone who was trying to kill us or our future child...

How did you find the illustrator and what was the process of working together like?

I met Gabriel because my godson, who is a big part of my life, was friends with his son in pre-school. It's been such a joy working together and we are already collaborating on a new thing. I had a whole script before he started working on the art. But unfortunately (or fortunately?) it changed thousands of times since that draft. This involved lots of redrawings and back and forth texts and calls. This project was very precious to me because I truly thought it could heal the country and also a personal relationship -oh the idealism! - but whenever I saw the story emerge into drawing form it was so moving and satisfying. I love our partnership because Gabriel offers a skillset I completely do not have and need.

How did you go about getting it published and why did you pick that route?What are the pros and cons of self-publishing versus traditional in your opinion?

Oh gosh publishing... I actually left a comfortable job at a talent agency due to a conflict of interest: I wanted to hire a literary agent to sell the book to a traditional publisher and I couldn't work there and be a client. Unfortunately, the literary agent and I were unable to find that publisher in 2024, so when the election happened in November 2024 here in America, I just felt like I didn't want to keep waiting and I went forward with self-publishing it via SerioComics and print on demand technology. Crowdfunding is something that I might want to consider in the future. I ended up paying Gabriel per page and all of that funding was already done by the time the book was ready to publish, so I felt a bit strange asking for funding then.

I will say the cons of self-publishing are significant in that it's challenging to get the book into bookstores or to have it seriously reviewed. The pros are that I have complete freedom over what is in the book, the timing and how it's promoted. And I really enjoy the DIY attitude! For instance, I have been selling copies outside of a local bookstore in LA, meeting really interesting people and having great dialogues along the way which I am not sure I would have done with a traditional publisher backing it.

What have the responses been so far? Who should read this book?

The responses so far have been positive and show that it may have been the right decision to publish now instead of continuing to wait for a traditional publisher. There is such a polarized divide in the US right now… When I sell the book on the street, couples will come and talk to me and say how ‘she thinks this’ and ‘he thinks that’ and they see the book as a way of working through either a gun issue or another political issue that separates them at times. I think that's one of the biggest audiences: people who feel like ideas separate them from loved ones yet still stay united.

You can get ‘Should we buy a gun?’ here.

Dave Cowen interviewed me as well. You can read that one here on his Substack.

I hope you enjoyed this little behind the scenes of my process as well as a fellow author’s. Now that my book is delivered, I’d be happy to write more about what the process was like. Is there anything you would like to know about the book or the making of it?

With love,