Welcome back to Waiting on the Trade, a monthly comics book club for people who don’t have time for monthly comics!
In this episode, guest host Tyler Marifke makes pizza his business, as we discuss Matt Fraction, David Aja, Steve Lieber, Jesse Hamm, Matt Hollingsworth, and Francesco Francavilla’s Hawkeye: Little Hits.
As the Twitter-sphere devolves into a series of Russian bots and pissed-off Star Wars fans, comics creators are trying something new. Or old? Technology goes in circles; sometimes it’s hard to keep track.
Rather than focusing on social media outreach, in which the aforementioned bots and villains can steer things off track, a number of creators are putting out old-school email newsletters. These newsletters, of course, promote the creators’ new books, but they also contain book recommendations, recipes, puns, slice of life stories, and a whole bunch of additional informative content. In short, they are wonderful, and I am loving them.
In the hopes of convincing these creators that their newsletters are entirely worth the time and effort put into them, I’m going to gush about them here. Hopefully, my gushing will convince you to sign up for these newsletters (or your favorite creator’s newsletter) as well.
Like many comics readers, I hope to one day publish my own comics. So I devour articles about process, and when I find a writer who goes deep talking about scripting, writer-artist relationships, or economics, I take note.
I’ve assembled the list below for those just starting to read about making comics. These five writers are, in my opinion, the best at talking process. They are not my five favorite writers period, though they’re all very good (and some would make that list). But they’re the ones who have the most to share about the act of writing, or at least the most patience to deal with those of us on the Internet who want to learn.
