Podcast: Behind the scenes of children’s graphic novels

This month, we interviewed Serah-Marie McMahon, a graphic novel editor at Annick Press. We talked about editing, comics and graphic novels, accessibility, and everything in between. Is the rise of comics and graphic novels just a trend? Find out what we think in this episode.

(Scroll down for a transcript of the conversation.)

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Further Reading/Listening

• Emerging trends in the Canadian market

• Buying and borrowing of Comics & Graphic Novels titles

Transcript

Adaobi Nnaobi: Welcome to the BookNet Canada podcast. I’m Adaobi Nnaobi, the Marketing & Research Associate and the host of this month’s episode.

Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Serah-Marie McMahon. Serah-Marie is currently an editor at Annick Press specializing in graphic novels. She is a former bookseller and children's specialist at Type Books. She was the founder and editor of WORN Fashion Journal, which ran for 10 years.

She is also the co-author of Killer Style: How Fashion Has Injured, Maimed, and Murdered Through History, which won the Norma Fleck Award for best Canadian children's non-fiction. In this interview, you will learn all about her experience editing for children's graphic novels, how she edits with accessibility in mind, her views on author care, and much more.

Adaobi: So, Serah-Marie, you've gone from bookseller to graphic novel editor. What has that transition been like? And how have the skills you learned as a bookseller translated into your current role?

Serah-Marie McMahon: It's been a really fun transition. I can't say that I don't miss being a bookseller because I do. There's nothing like a bunch of kids on a Sunday really excited about the newest Dog Man release, but I find that really I'm still kind of a bookseller. I'm just selling a smaller amount of books and ones that I've worked on much closer for a much longer amount of time.

So, I'm selling the book to the people I work with, to the marketing department. I'm selling the book to the booksellers. I'm selling them to the distributors, to the sales team. I'm constantly convincing people that the book that I feel is awesome is also a book that they should feel is awesome. So definitely a lot of those skills, like, translated, and also just even how I shape and form and position a book is really affected by my time as a bookseller.

You know, I can really sit and imagine, "How would I explain this book to somebody who came into the store? Does it work in that capacity? Like, will it be something that will be easy for booksellers to be able to pick up and sell or not?" And I think that my years as a bookseller really gave me insight into that. What was the second part of the question?

Adaobi: How have the skills you learned as a bookseller translated into your current role?

Serah-Marie: Yeah, so I think there's a lot of that. A lot of talking with people about what they love and what they like and why they read is still very much part of my job, even if it's just the conversations I have with authors, which are very much about scurrying out their feelings and emotions about storytelling.

Adaobi: I never thought about it in that particular way before like, selling to the people you work with basically to take on a book. That's really interesting. Can you tell me something you learned from editing your two most recent graphic novels Living With Viola and The Wolf Suit? Because I know they're very different types of books.

Serah-Marie: Yeah, they really are. So, Living With Viola is like a middle grade I call it like, memoir-ish. You know, it's based on Rosena, the author's life, Rosena Fung, but not literally. It's a really fun galloping romping, middle-grade book and The Wolf Suit is an early reader that is a little creepier and quieter, a little more metaphorical. It is all hand-painted and really, really rich and lush, but both of those authors are people who have a deep history in creating beautiful visual work. And that's always where I tend to start is by finding people who have a very like, rich visual narrative in their work already and then helping them figure out how to turn that into a story that can last, you know, in the case of The Wolf Suit, 120 pages. But in the case of Living With Viola, like, 265 pages, that's a lot of story to tell. A lot of the time, I'm working with people who are artists first and helping them figure out how to shape and tell a story.

And usually, the instinct is to get them to write it down first, write it down first and then draw it. But actually, I found with a lot of artists, that's not the best way to do it. The best way to do it is to get them to draw because that's how they write. That's their medium. Their medium is imagery rather than words. So where they can get kind of stuck on words, they can sort it out through drawing. That's like, the biggest lesson that I've learned.

Adaobi: So, you start with the concept and then the story?

Serah-Marie: Yeah. Well, usually what we do is, yeah, there's a lot of talking about what the book is about. So, what is the concept of the book, but also a little bit what the plot is. So those two things, like what happens in the book but then also what is the book about, which are kind of, they're related but they can be two different things.

And then once we kind of determined that, I often will get the artist to create a beat sheet. So something that is just like an outline, and it can be anywhere from, you know, four pages to like, you know I have one that I'm working on now for a middle-grade book that the beat sheet is like over 30 pages long because it's gonna be a like, 250-page book. So that goes into a little bit more detail.

But it's just a basic summary of like the overarching plot, what happens and what, you know, your character arcs are gonna contain. And then, so there is a little bit of writing there, but I usually find that if an artist gets stuck like they're not sure how they want to move from one thing to the next thing, I'll say, "Why don't you try to draw? Like, why don't you try to draw to figure it out?" And they'll maybe draw a little scene or they'll draw a few pages of the panel work to kind of sort out what it is they want to happen there. And yeah, they'll do it very rough. I really encourage people to just do it with like pencil or digital drawings that are like really chicken scratch, but I find I'm fairly good at being able to interpret those and sort of see them for what they are.

And then from there, when you start to like outline the book, instead of making a script, I mean, you can. Every book is different. Like, every single book is different because it's tailored to whoever's writing it. And graphic novels, if I've learned anything, is that there is no one way to do it. Everybody does it differently. I've listened to so many podcasts. I've sat in so many like Q&As at TCAF and at the Montreal Comic Arts Fair.

And like everyone, I just learned that everybody does it their own way. So, this is like, I try to adjust based on who it is but usually what ends up happening is they'll do like a super, super rough pencil scribble, scribble, either on paper or like, digitally with a digital pen. And then from there, I'll go in and start giving them notes about how to shape and form. Usually, at first, they're just very general notes and then the longer we're working on the project, the more detailed those notes will get.

Adaobi: Okay.

Serah-Marie: Does that make sense?

Adaobi: Yeah, it makes total sense. One more question on this topic. So, you're not an art director, you're the editor and I wonder what is that … You play both roles?

Serah-Marie: Yeah.

Adaobi: Or do you work with the art director?

Serah-Marie: The way that it happens at Annick is that I mostly work with the artists one-on-one because they're author-illustrators. So, they're telling the story with their art. So, it's very hard because we're editing story right until like almost the very end. It's not just a matter of editing the art itself as a visual medium, though I'm doing that as well, but I'm still editing for story right until the end.

And that relationship between like, an editor and an art director is very fluid and changes, like, company to company and project to project and, like, individual to individual. So, it's always gonna be, like, ebbing and flowing between how those two work together and every company approaches it in a different way.

Adaobi: Wow. That's good to know. So, in 2019, you co-wrote Killer Style: How Fashion Has Injured, Maimed, and Murdered Through History, a fashion history book for children. How has that experience helped you when you edit graphic novels for children now?

Serah-Marie: So, I loved writing that book. It was super, super fun to do. And the thing I think I brought away from it the most is that your job as an editor is to work on the page, work on the words and the art on the page to bring out the best story possible. But also part of your job is everything else that goes with making a book. So author bios, back cover copy, how to position it to marketing.

I also do some work in the marketing department, so I do a lot of like author relations stuff. So, because I've been on the other side of the table, I have a good view on, like, what it's like to come into this process not knowing anything. I'd worked in magazine publishing but never in book publishing before that. So it was like, I knew what kind of questions I would have and, what it is I wanted to know and what was confusing and what sort of direction was useful.

I feel like I can be very empathetic with, you know, getting stuck, being late on deadlines and, like, not wanting to tell my editor. So it's a lot of the author care. Like, a lot of the what it's like to be an author in 2022 in Toronto is something that I'm like intimately acquainted with. So, I feel like I can offer a lot of help in that respect. But in terms of the actual writing, it's very different. Like, graphic novels and non-fiction for kids are two really different things but I'm really excited to do non-fiction graphic novels. I think that it's starting to become really popular. And I think that there are some really interesting ways that we can talk about non-fiction topics with graphic novels.

Adaobi: Do you read any non-fiction graphic novels?

Serah-Marie: Well, right now the vast majority of non-fiction graphic novels are focused on biography, memoir, and a little bit history. That's the main focus of it, but I find it starting to break out. Like, I actually just took a whole bunch of books out of the library, literally right beside me, but I've noticed that, like, people have been doing a really good job. Like, I read this one book about animals. It's like a non-fiction book about animals, like a middle-grade graphic novel. And what they did is sort of tell stories about interesting things about animals, but were story formed. Like, they're shaped like a narrative of telling a story. And I think that that's how people get really interested in non-fiction is like when it's formed like a story. Like that's like podcasts are like that too. Like, that's like a really big thing.

Like non-fiction podcasts that are shaped like a story like This American Life, you know. There's no reason that you can't do that for kids too if you're gonna tell them about animals. Sure, you can give them a bunch of facts, but it's way more interesting if you're telling them a story. And if you tell an interesting story, then there's no reason that you can't make that a panelled story. So, I'm really excited for us as a medium for that to move more into the non-fiction realm.

Adaobi: Right. Let's rewind a little. Author care. When you were talking about it, before you had even said that, that was the very first thing on my mind. And I was wondering, so what does author care look like for you? Because I don't think many people think of author care when they think of editors.

Serah-Marie: Yeah. Well, again, every editor is different. Every company is different. Every part of publishing is different. But for me, I see my job as a guide. Right? My goal is to help somebody take the story that they have inside of them, whatever that potential has, and then bring it out in the best possible version. Like, whatever it is they're trying to say and then help them figure out how to say that in the very best way possible. And that can require really, like, paying attention to what those authors need and their best way of telling stories and knowing that that is not, like, a one-size-fits-all. So some people, their best stories emerge when you just talk. Talk about how their lives are going and ask them a bunch of questions and then what they've been thinking about lately, and then things start to emerge or really talking about, like, your family history. Like that's a really big one.

I spend a lot of time talking to people about like, what it was like for them as children. Like, I write kids' books. So that's like a really heavy topic of conversation. And I share a little bit about my life too because I want them to know that I can be vulnerable as well so that they can trust me to help them like, figure out things. Right? So there's a lot of that. And that's good for some people. And then some people are not interested in that at all. It's not a good way for them to work. Like, they don't find stories that way. Some people, it's much better to talk to them about other books that they've read. And, you know, they'll give me a list of books that they really love and I will read them and I'll give them a list of books that I feel are related to what they've offered me. And then we will discuss how those books work and how they tell really great stories. And that can be a really good avenue.

So, there's a lot of different ways that you can get to, like, sort of crack that nut. I very, very frequently and in fact, almost exclusively to this point work, work with first-time authors. So, it is people like really trying to both figure out how they want to tell stories but also figuring out who they are and what their work process is. Like, you know, it's really easy to be like, "Okay, well, how long is it gonna take you to do thumbnails?" And they'll be like, "Two weeks." And I'm like, "I think it's gonna take longer than two weeks." But they don't know how long it takes them to do things. They've never inked 650, you know, panels in a weekend. So, as you get more experience, you get to understand yourself a little better. So I can help guide them through that. So that's like the creation care but it's also care for me through the entire process.

I do a lot of development. So, I work with authors to put together a proposal in the first place. Like, this isn't something that they've done on their own. I'm helping them write from conception of idea to putting together proposal to acquisition and then through to creation. And then often even after that into sales and marketing and promotion, just because of the role I play in the marketing department as well.

So, I really tend to see authors through the entire thing and different authors are good at different things. Like, some people are like, "Yes, put me in front of a room full of children. I love it. I'll talk forever. It's the greatest thing.” “Put me on a panel. It's, like, so fantastic." And other people, it's not their strong suit but they're really great in an interview or like making merchandise. Like, that's where they're really gonna shine. So, we're going to, you know, push sending out merchandise to independent booksellers to get people interested. There's just a lot of different angles that you can take. So, to me, author care is really seeing people for who they are, taking them where they're at, and helping them be the best people that they can … I sound like a therapist, but I really believe that. I really believe that that's my role.

Adaobi: Yeah. I like that piece of the editor role so much. It's so interesting. And I don't think a lot of people think about that. Annick is one of the first global certified accessible children's book publishers. You have some experience with making books accessible. How do you edit graphic novels with accessibility in mind? And what tips can you share with other editors who are hoping to incorporate accessibility into their own workflows?

Serah-Marie: So. I need to give a shout-out to Brendan for being such like, an awesome person on our team who is very committed to accessibility in all our books. And I have to say, I love telling authors that that's something that we do. It's really exciting when I'm meeting with first-time potential authors and I can be like, "Actually, these are all the great things we're doing." Including, like, on ebooks, but also audiobooks and really showing a wide range of how people can access the stories that we tell. So, I really believe that stories can be told in many different mediums and that they shouldn't just be restricted to one way. And you should be able to take advantage of whatever medium you're accessing to enhance your story to the best of its ability, like taking advantage of that new medium.

So, in audiobooks, it can be sound and noises and in description it can be, you know, like, description is very interesting and I'm super fascinated by it and it's actually something I want to spend more time on. But knowing when and how to reveal information so that you're allowing your reader to be able to interpret visual cues in the same way that a sighted reader can so that they're getting the same experience. You don't want to tell them how they should feel but allow them to be able to, like, interpret how they feel and knowing how much information you need to give them to be able to do that. I try not to think about it too much in the actual creation of the initial story. Because I feel like if you work hard enough at it, you can figure out interesting and creative ways to express something visual to somebody who can't see it or something auditory to someone who can't hear it. Like, if you're creative about it, you can figure out really interesting ways to do that. And I would like to respect the skill of the people who do that part of the job to not feel like I need to, like, coach things or change things in advance in anticipation that they won't be able to do that. Because I think part of that challenge is part of the fun of it too. So, I try not to think about it too much.

However, that said, I think it is really helpful to create an accessible script at the same time as you're developing the book and not wait till it's a hundred percent done and then to make it because it's almost like helpful a little bit in that you'll notice when you're... There's certain things that'll start to pop out to you that you're doing that can be resolved or solved that it's really hard to do once the project's already finished.

So, that's something I would recommend to do is to before the project is completely done to start working on what that accessible script will actually look like. And that'd be pretty cool.

Adaobi: I was wondering though, do you think that there is a sort of limiting factor to thinking of accessibility in the creation stage of things?

Serah-Marie: I think that it's a tool and how much you're restricted by it is how much you choose to wield it or not wield it. So, I think you can absolutely a hundred percent create limitations on your project if you decide that that's what you need to do but I don't think you have to. Like, I think that if you trust that the person who is creating the accessibility part of the content can do interesting and creative things, then you shouldn't have any like real restrictions on what you need to do to tell your story.

I also think that it's always good to be questioning yourself about how and why you tell your story. Like, there's certain limitations that are put on like… For example, for graphic novels we're looking to sell things into translation. And actually, The Wolf Suit, doesn't even come out until October but we've already sold it into Korea and into France. So, Korean language takes up more room than English does and we knew that going in. So when Sid created the ... The author is Sid Sharp, and when they created the speech bubbles, they created it in mind that there should be a lot of room and a lot of space because if we wanted Korean text to be inserted later, there needed to be the room for that. So, we're already thinking about things that are outside of the domain of what's actually going on on the page. So, I don't think so. I think that having a couple little things that you need to pay attention to are worthwhile.

I think the biggest barriers come with non-fiction layout and design when it comes to accessibility, which it's not something that I really work on. That's just hearsay from other parts of the company, but also having a history of working on non-fiction books and magazines for so long that I do think that, you know, it's still a developing technology. And I think that as it catches things better in terms of, like, column layouts and, you know, sidebars and all kinds of stuff, like, expressing visual information within a non-fiction book is like a little bit trickier. At least a panel has, like, a direction. Like, graphic novels have, like, a path that you're really supposed to follow. Whereas non-fiction layout sometimes doesn't have any kind of a path. And then I think that makes it a little bit tricky. So thinking about paths I think is, like, a good idea.

So, like how you would want to bring your reader through a certain topic, but I think that also the technology's new and it'll get there. Again, that's not something I know that much about because it's just something I've, like, heard about and witnessed and not something I've actually worked on.

Adaobi: Yeah. That's like the one thing I know for sure about accessibility it's like, we're not there yet with the technology and I can't wait until we are, but in the meantime, it's like you kind of have to make your choices.

Serah-Marie: Yeah, but choices, that's what editing is, is choices. You're making choices all the time and that's storytelling. So, you're just telling the same story in a slightly different way. To me, I really think about accessibility as a translation. I don't know if that's how people who do accessibility writing are called translators but I think they should be because I think that's what you're doing. It's the same thing as translating a book for, you know, from English into French, to translate a book to like, visual to auditory. Like, that's a translation. You're making choices about how you want to interpret a story, about how you want to say it, how you want to give people the emotional feeling but with a different language. And that's what that is.

Adaobi: Yeah. You're the first person who ever, like, mentioned it in that way to me as translation and I just love your point of view.

Serah-Marie: Thanks.

Adaobi: It's so like, magical and fairy dust and like, awesome. I mean, it's uplifting. It's so uplifting to like, think about something in a very different, you know, point of view.

Serah-Marie: Yeah. Well, we work in a magic and fairy dust world. I work in kid lit, like, come on. You spend like years on end helping little children be very gleeful about stories. Like, yeah, that's what we do. It's awesome.

Adaobi: Okay. Next question. Comics and Graphic novels are an emerging trend. In 2021, we saw an increase in units sold in all age categories for Comics and Graphic novels. Adult sales increased 61% in 2021 over 2020. Juvenile sales increased by 12% and young adult sales increased by 76%. Where do you see the future of comics and graphic novels going in the Canadian book market? I think you've kind of answered this a little bit previously.

Serah-Marie: I did. Yeah. I did in the non-fiction I think is an interesting place where we're gonna go and what I would really like to focus on and I know I'm not the only one. But I love that 76% statistic. I wonder how much that has to do with manga.

Adaobi: It's a lot.

Serah-Marie: Yeah, which is translation right? And I think that has a lot to do with Netflix, like, and how much anime is become accessible to people, especially over the pandemic and how the streaming services have really taken an international hold. Like, I watch K-Dramas and I never did before I had streaming services. And that then in turn led me to manga and like Korean graphic novels. So, I think that that's opening up a whole new world to people and leading them to, like, where those stories originated from. And then from there, they like them so much that they're like, "Oh, what else is going on?" And like, looking around and seeing what else exists. So, I see more manga becoming more and more interesting but also I would really like to see a diaspora-originated manga. That's something that I personally am, like, very interested in and very invested in and I've already acquired a few things that qualify in that way. So, I'd like to see that happen more because there's a lot of people who grew up in Asia and grew up reading manga, and that is, like, their primary comic medium. I would like to see what that looks like now that they live in North America and have like a mix of, like, a North American perspective too. So, I think that would be really cool. That's something I really want to see and I hope happens.

I think that graphic novels are... I don't think they're a trend. I think they're here to stay. It's been growing for so long on such, like, an incline that I think it's just... I think it's a couple things. One, it is gatekeepers like librarians and awarding committees and teachers taking the medium seriously and not treating it like a lesser storytelling vehicle. Like, there's graphic novels and then there's real books.

As soon as you get rid of that dichotomy, or not dichotomy. Diptic? Anyways, you know, when two things are compared to each other. So, as soon as you get rid of that, then that opens up a whole lot of things because we can't forget that the vast majority of books for children are not bought by their end user. They're bought by somebody else to give to the end user, unlike most other literature. Right? So, you have to convince parents that a graphic novel is a real book, which is very much... Like, that's part of the conversation. So, as that has changed, I think that has affected sales a lot and I don't think there's a going back from that. I think that just is now. But I think the second thing is that we've really discovered that people, you know, as there's a lot of consideration to individual ways that people process information and also acknowledging that the way that people read can be completely different. So, there's a level of comprehension and understanding that is like, a lot more accessible with a graphic novel than with like, a straight reading book. And as people are more attuned, more sensitive and acknowledge that more and more, I think they're seeing the value and the use of graphic novels in terms of helping people understand stories.

Adaobi: Yes. I fully understand that. And actually, it takes me back. So, in university, I took an English course that was all about Comics and Graphic novels. And we did have some graphic novels that were non-fiction. And like you said, they were all memoir-type of style, autobiography and things like that. But something that was also mentioned in the class was, well, in the olden days, it was not olden days. Well, the olden days.

Serah-Marie: Yeah. I know what you mean.

Adaobi: When people used to talk about graphic novels and Comics, comics in particular, back in the day. I mean, if you were anyone reading a comic, I mean, I'm even talking about the early 2000s, you were under this label of like nerd and whatever else. Right? And I feel like that's probably what has pulled the comic and graphic novel genre down for so long. I mean, people were still reading it but like before it's like, you have to like read and then don't tell anybody that you read comics. Right?

I feel like now more people...just like with anime, like when I was younger in high school, like, you don't talk about anime, you don't say you're watching anime because it's like, "Why? That's weird." But now like everyone's, you know, watching anime and everyone's reading some type of manga or, you know.

Serah-Marie: Yeah. The nerd has definitely been rebranded, you know, and given a position of like content king. And I'm good with that. I mean, I was like such a nerd when I was a kid, though I didn't read manga or graphic novels or comics really when I was a kid, though I loved Archie with every fibre in my being.

Adaobi: Same.

Serah-Marie: Yeah.

Adaobi: Same.

Serah-Marie: Yeah. For me, it wasn't even so much that like, I didn't like it. It's just that I didn't really have access to it. And that's changed, right? Is that we have a lot more access to everything. Content is a lot more available. The global market is a lot more apparent. It's easier to find, it's easier to acquire than it's ever been before. So, you know, that really helps, I think, everything gets into people's hands who want it, and that changes the power dynamic I think a little bit. It becomes something that's like, very popular plus it's just great storytelling all the time. So, it totally makes sense.

Adaobi: I think the moment where I realized, "Oh, this is like, people are interested in this," is when Megan Thee Stallion like said that she watched like, was it Boku no Hero? And people were like, "Oh, my God. She watches! Now it’s popular.”

Serah-Marie: Yeah. I don't know but like, it's funny. I know what you're saying and I totally get what you're saying, but also there was always a contingency of, like, the actually cool people who always read comics. If you look at comics with like an X, you know, really like Eileen Kaminski and like... I’m really bad at names, this is terrible but there was like a whole bunch of like very cool, very weird underground comics that happened in like, the '60s and '70s and '80s. And there's all kinds of really interesting stories that were told then too, and it was like the cool art kids that read it. You know, like, that were like, comics that were infiltrating like the art world. And so I think that the people who read comics have always been the kind of cool kids. They're just the down-low cool kids. They're the underdog cool kids. Like the actually cool people, you know, the people actually have like interesting stuff to say and talk about.

And I'm just glad that on a bigger scope it's been like... I feel like the idea of like, cool and not cool kids is, I don't know. I feel like it's just not as much of an issue anymore. I think it's more about like, what kind of group of friends are you interested in hanging out with. What kind of interests does everyone have as opposed to this like, hierarchy of, like, of a pecking order?

I think that is just like way less of a concern for kids than it was when you and I were children, which makes me really happy. I really hope that's true. I think it's true but I don't know. And I really hope it is.

Adaobi: I mean, I don't know. There are no studies on this but I have been hearing a lot about how Gen Z, they just do whatever they want and like, that's influencing everybody else. They just wear whatever, read whatever. And it's like, they're just being themselves and that's influencing the whole culture, right? Because now they are the pop culture children, basically.

Serah-Marie: Yep. I love it. Can't wait till Gen Z takes over the world. I'm thrilled.

Adaobi: Okay. Apart from reading children's books, what other forms of media informs your editing?

Serah-Marie: Okay. So, I really like this question because the thing is I feel really strongly, this goes a little bit back to that question about storytelling and how I feel like I'm in the business of storytelling. I'm not in the business of making books necessarily, I'm in the business of creating stories. So, whether those end up being audio stories or comics or prose novels, I don't see the difference, you know, but also I do have to say that I find I end up having a lot more conversations with authors that I'm working with.

I'm talking with them about television and about movies as much, if not more than I'm talking to them about books because graphic novels and television have way more in common than a graphic novel and a prose book. Like you're thinking about scenes, you're thinking about page turns. You're thinking about what you're looking at and what is being said and also what is being unsaid on every page and every panel. And your pacing is much more akin to a television show than it is to a traditional prose novel a lot of the time, especially when it comes to passage of time, which I find really, really interesting when it comes to graphic novels. Exactly how much time passes like between panels and between pages and between scenes and how that information is like, visually understood is really, really different. And it's a really important part of the story and it's really different than how the functionality and structure is for a prose novel. But actually, for television, it makes a lot of sense, especially the more, like, the last few years when television has really reduced itself to seasons of 6 or 10 episodes. Like, those have really a lot in common with a graphic novel. And in fact, often originate from graphic novels.

If you look at something like Umbrella Academy would be like a really great example, or Paper Girls, which just came out. I could name a lot more but those are two of my favourites recently. Or Heartstopper, or like, there's so many. But it's not just the ones that have originated from that material, but just short seasons in general. Like, they just make a lot of sense as structurally as having things in common with a graphic novel. So, that's definitely a hundred percent something that I talk about a lot. And I go to the movies all the time and I watch everything because to me that's just as important as reading everything.

Adaobi: Do you find that the authors you work with are also inspired by other forms of media?

Serah-Marie: So, this goes totally back to the question of author care, right? It depends. Like, all authors are different. There are authors that I work with that, like, Rosena Fung reads everything. Like, she's a voracious reader. She reads like crazy. And if I'm like, "Oh yeah, this is kind of like this scene in a movie." And she's like, "I haven't seen that." She's not a big movie and film watcher so that's not a good point of reference for her. Like, that's not where she's being informed. So that's not where I need to come from with her. But other people that I've worked with, I like absolutely, like, I'm working with one person, the book doesn't come out till 2024 but she works in animation like that's her day job is that she does like backgrounds for cartoons. And we're doing a series and it's like highly informed by Saturday morning cartoon structure. The series like really feels like that. Like, that's how we talked about it. We even used the language of like animation and cartoons. We kept calling it episode one and episode two instead of book one and book two because that's really how we were thinking about it, right? And there's a lot of things in common there.

So, for me, it's about constantly adapting to whatever influences the people I'm working with have, and to me, that's the funnest part. It's so exciting. It's always changing and it's always different. And like trying to dig into people's heads and figure out where they're coming from is, like, infinitely exciting to me.

Adaobi: Thank you, Serah-Marie, for joining me to talk about editing, graphic novels, accessibility, and everything in between. Before we go, I'd like to take a moment to acknowledge that BookNet Canada staff, board, partners, and our makeshift podcast studio operate upon the traditional territories of the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation, the Anishinaabe, Haudenosaunee, and Wendat indigenous peoples, the original nations of this land. We endorse the calls to action from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada and support an ongoing shift from gatekeeping to space-making in the book industry. And we hope that our work, including this podcast, helps to create an environment that supports that shift. We'd also like to acknowledge the government of Canada for their financial support through the Canada Book Fund. And, of course, thanks to you for listening.