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USDN Podcast is a cinematic indie comics interview series hosted by the USDN_Chairman and the Council of Nerds spotlighting the creators, storytellers, and worldbuilders shaping the future of independent comics.
Each episode dives beyond headlines into the real journeys behind the books from Kickstarter launches and creative struggles to the philosophies driving today’s indie storytelling movement.
This isn’t about rumors or recycled news.
It’s about the people creating the worlds.
Through in-depth conversations, creator spotlights, and crowdfunding discussions, USDN explores:
• The rise of indie comics
• The business of crowdfunding
• The art of worldbuilding
• The realities of independent storytelling
USDN is where indie comics come to life for the fans, by the creators, and powered by the community.
You are listening to the USDN on the
DFPN.
Thanks for watching!
What is up, everyone,
and welcome to the United States
Department of Nerds,
where we are for the people,
by the people, and of the people.
Tonight,
we are stepping into a story that blends
history, family legacy, crime, vengeance,
and the kind of title that makes you
stop in your tracks,
the Mafia versus the Klan.
Our guest tonight is writer and creator
C.E.
Masari,
whose upcoming one hundred twenty page
original graphic novel is being released
from with Source Point Press.
I'm so happy they are back and is
preparing for a Kickstarter pre-sale
campaign ahead of its wider release.
This book is described as John Wick meets
the Godfather.
But underneath that cinematic hook is
something much different.
deeper.
This is a historical noir inspired by real
family history,
including his grandfather's experiences
with the Klan and the tragic murder of
Agustina Massari.
So tonight we're going to talk about the
story, behind the story,
how you turn real trauma into fiction,
how you write about hate without giving it
power,
and how a creator builds a graphic novel
that is equal parts personal legacy,
historical fiction,
and crime revenge epic.
Ladies and gentlemen,
the Council of Nerds is now in session.
CE, welcome to the council, my friend.
I'm happy to be here.
Always happy to talk comics and just happy
to talk in general.
I run my mouth a lot.
Hey,
I understand it comes with the business
that you are in and the business I
used to be in.
It's kind of what we do, man.
But we can talk some more about that
one later.
But let's dive into this, man.
Who is CE?
And how did you get into comics?
Yeah, I always like,
at least for some of my bios,
I put hailing from the slums of Shaolin,
but not really.
It's my Wu-Tang reference,
big Wu-Tang thing, land reference.
aficionado liquid source the greatest
album of all time routine is always for
the children no matter what age they are
um so yeah uh i started getting into
comics when i was younger uh like a
lot of people probably of my generation as
we call it sound like an old man
um kid fox kids tv you know x-men
spider-man
the Batman series,
the Batman the Animated Series,
Batman Beyond, all those kind of things.
I grew up with that Saturday morning
cartoon aspect of comics.
I can actually say one of my current
friends, he's a lawyer now,
but when we were in school,
he used to bring in his Daredevil comics,
and I was like, oh,
I love these TV shows.
He's bringing in comics.
I should go out and find them.
Get my own physical copies.
So this is about fifth grade.
I started going to a local comic shop,
Um,
I specifically remember it cause the guy
had a black hat.
He was like the, the,
the cat of the comic store.
Um,
and that just kind of what started it.
I stuck with it.
It's always ebbed and flowed.
Uh,
I'm sure with a lot of people who
read comics, you know,
depending where you are in finances, time,
all that fun stuff.
So sometimes you have good years and
you're getting like everything off the
shelf.
And I'm in the period now where I
don't really read too much.
I don't really look at too much only
because one, I don't really have the time.
Um, and two, I'm a little, uh,
I'm interested in other stories that
aren't comics.
And I don't mean that in a derogatory
way.
If there's stuff that I like,
like I've heard really good things about
Absolute Batman.
I actually got my son.
He's eleven.
I got him started with a pull bin
at a comic shop that I used to
go to frequent on Absolute Batman.
I got him on Moon Knight.
So I still love comics.
I still love the genre.
I'm just at kind of a different point
in the amount of time that I can
spend with the family, with kids,
with the job.
I own a business.
I've got a lot of things going on.
So my time is very precious.
And there's a lot of comics and there's
a lot of issues in the comics industry
as a whole.
I'm sure a lot of people feel the
same way.
It's just hard to get excited.
It's a lot of recycling of ideas.
It's a lot of recycling of stories.
That's why I stay with the indies, man.
If you stay with the indie comics,
you ain't got to worry about that.
That's my problem.
I have a lot of indie friends and
I'll back their Kickstarters.
That's really the only time that I read
comics.
You can go broke just doing that.
That's the other issue.
You end up spending way more than you
probably should and my wife sees it and
it's like,
why are you backing other Kickstarters?
It's like, well,
this looks cool and it's a friend.
I want to support them.
I literally just bat three this week.
And it's just like people I know,
people I admire in the industry, you know,
people that have been on the podcast.
It's like they're sacking our third book.
And I know that I know they're writing.
I know how they are.
I'm like, dude,
I know that book is going to be
good.
Let me go ahead and get that.
So, I mean,
you look at the industry as a whole.
Kickstarter, Indiegogo,
whatever you're using as far as your
crowdfunding are great.
The problem is all the back end stuff
to get it noticed.
Yeah.
is like guys not being what it quite
was and you know hey there's the big
big publishers and then smaller ones and
that's how you get picked up the other
issues like hey to get noticed you got
to really do the we'll call it the
groundwork um to get noticed and things on
your kickstarter your indigo whatever
you're doing crowdfunding but all also
gives you a lot of control um it
gives you a lot of control of your
product i started well started i would say
started
Before getting started and getting into
it,
what I actually want to do is fight
professionally at this time.
We'll call my origin story.
Actually,
before you before you get to that,
that's actually a lead into the next
question.
So before.
No, no, no, no.
You're perfect.
You were going.
But I want to get this question in
because the.
the answer you're about to give is going
to answer this question.
Yeah.
So before we get into the mafia versus
the clan,
what was your path into writing and
journalism into comics?
Now you can go with that part because
I know that personally is this answer to
this.
Perfect.
I was on pace.
It's like,
I got a little bit of a,
I say this jokingly, uh,
uh experience in this which i'll get into
as far as like i have journalistic
integrity and he did not get any questions
before this so i did not i would
never send my questions beforehand um so
like i said i got started comics and
i always loved the stories like i was
reading manga in high school and like
sixth seventh and eighth grade when it was
a weird
thing to do now i understand you know
like every celebrity my daughter went on
started in like elementary school like
fourth or fifth grade yeah i didn't
understand what manga was at the time and
then she's like well we just take me
to the bookstore so i can show you
so i took her to the bookstore and
this is kind of like her her origin
story i guess into this
but I was like, oh,
it's just a Japanese comic book,
basically.
She was like, yeah.
I was like, okay, bet.
So you're asking me to read a book.
Yeah.
I'm like, okay, cool.
Yeah.
I'm not going to say, no,
you can't read a book.
That would be like a mean thing to
do.
My daughter's like standing right there.
She's listening.
So when I say manga...
like again most kids of my age dragon
ball z was the thing i was the
person you know with beckett dragon ball z
if anyone remembers that like those
magazines where my local game art yeah
fantastic you know everyone speculate in
super snake five six seven eight that was
my entry point um i was doing kung
fu at the time a lot of the
guys who were training there they were
already into naruto when it was early on
a lot of other anime and stuff like
that's what got me into manga but i
was always into
We'll call it the visual arts, comics,
manga, American, Western, you know,
whatever you want to call it.
And I always wanted to write it.
The thing was,
I didn't know how that would happen.
Also, I love my dad,
but my dad is very much like, OK,
you're going to do that.
How are you going to pay your bills?
So I was looking into a lot of
different avenues as far as what I was
going to do.
I was going to go to school.
I wanted to go into the military.
I want to do like a special forces
thing, you know,
a whole all over the place thing.
But I was always doing martial arts since
I was like five years old,
which got started because of the Power
Rangers.
Actually, of course, Green Ranger,
who actually got that was really cool.
At one point in my career,
I got to interview him and he was
the reason.
Yeah.
R.I.P.
I met him.
I worked with him in a couple different
occasions.
I worked at a martial arts company.
He was one of our clients.
I almost got to put together.
so this is something i haven't told to
anyone so you're getting i like it right
here i like it i'll send you the
art too is i almost got a comic
with him um so this was right before
he signed with valiant um for was it
bloodshot or whatever me and a publisher i
was working at the time we had some
sketches done we had a whole story boarded
um he was working at a martial arts
company that basically created him as the
most people don't know this is a company
called educational funding company um they
oh you know efc yeah i'm aware of
it okay so i used to when they
were trying to go through a revamp i
used to work for them um so they
did a lot with jason david frank you
know a lot of the big martial artists
at the time um and so i got
connected with him i was like hey do
you remember me from this interview and
then we got talking
So I actually have some comic sketches and
some concept art for a story that we
were going to do.
He signed the contract and, you know,
it never went anywhere past that.
In saying all that,
I always wanted to write and I've been
doing martial arts since I was five.
I was getting into MMA,
was watching it for a while and I
was doing Kung Fu,
but then I was like, oh, well,
if I want to do MMA,
like I need to learn Jiu Jitsu and
all these other things,
sort of branch into that.
And there's, if anyone's,
probably some might remember it some might
not there's a show called bully beat down
my favorite fighter one of the greatest
people of all time mayhem miller that i
wanted to be mayhem miller i had my
own red stripe to my hair i should
tell my whatever happened to me hair
school hey mayhem i'm so happy to hear
this mayhem had a really really bad turn
of events he is now the men's he's
sober he's doing a lot of social media
he's training he's teaching
It's the greatest comeback story.
And I love seeing it because he was
someone I was like,
he was the host of Bully Beatdown,
wasn't he?
Yeah.
Yep.
Host of Bully Beatdown.
And that's why I use that as the
way most people aren't going to know him
from mixed martial arts.
I knew him from MMA before he did
Bully Beatdown.
Hey,
his entrances are hands down some of the
greatest things I've ever seen of all
time.
Super original.
When people talk about Adesanya, no.
Mayhem Miller, he's the king.
There's hands down no one doing entrances
like him,
but I want to be the next Mayhem.
That was who I wanted to emulate myself.
And I was like, oh, I can pivot.
What I'll do is I'll have this career
in MMA.
Even if it's not that good,
I can do the Mayhem thing.
I can make entrances.
I can market myself, yada, yada, yada,
and pivot that to a writing career because
how else are you going to do it?
Now that didn't work out.
I ended up getting hurt.
But that mindset when I was in college,
my first year or two,
I was a double major in history and
philosophy and religious studies.
I was like, my backup plan will be,
I'll be a history teacher.
But after like a year or two,
I was like, I could go into journalism.
It'll teach me how to write.
So it's a professional thing that kind of
makes my,
my parents happy that I'm not wasting
money at college.
Like, Hey, I have a professional path.
Yeah.
And I'm also in,
the martial arts thing i can use that
as my sports journalism avenue so use that
i was interviewing fighters um frankie
edgar i was interviewing some guys on his
team and it really sucked because we were
supposed to interview frankie before
frankie became frank yeager and i will
always hold this over uh my friend in
the times head his battery died on his
camera and he forgot he he did filming
and he forgot his extra.
And so we didn't end up going over
to Frankie's interview before he became –
That's what I mean.
Before that,
like when Kurt Pellegrino – like I could
name guys all day.
This is how old I feel and how
long I've been doing this sport to name
guys that nobody who even watches UFC now
– Dude,
I was picking him as a fighter when
I was doing a Leeds –
I remember the website.
It used to be a website,
like an MMA website.
They would have all the amateur fights,
the UFCs, the Bellators.
They had fight leagues where you were on
a league, on a team.
No, no, similar, very similar.
And then you would go through and you'd
pick the fighters who you thought were
going to win, you know,
based on their win-losses,
whatever stats they would give you.
And some of those up-and-coming guys at
the time really went a whole lot out
of there.
So you were just shooting from the hip,
like kind of like that dude's, you know,
nickname, you know.
a cool nickname i'm going to go with
that guy he's a killer he's a killer
i think name sucks i'm not going here
yeah so you would just like and then
at the end of the the you know
the following monday you would tally and
your your your league your team would win
you know just you didn't win but it
was just a really cool fun thing to
do right
And that was just so fun.
But I was picking Frankie Edgar before he
was Frankie Edgar on a lot of things
because, like,
I had seen one of his amateur fights,
and it was just like, like, damn,
did the other dude, like,
he knew he was coming into a fight,
right?
And apparently he didn't because Frankie
Edgar, like, he was done.
I was like, damn,
this fight didn't even get started.
He competed over the week,
or maybe it was two weekends ago,
but recently in the Real American
Federation.
I was talking to my dad about this.
Actually, like, right before I came here,
my son was at T-Ball.
He knows him, too.
And you can just see the wear and
tear on his body.
Like I said,
he moved like an old Italian man.
I don't mean that, like, disrespectfully.
It's just you see the punishment.
And he's only in his forties.
Like, the inability to move.
That's what they say.
The dude's the same age as me,
I think.
Yeah.
It was like his neck wasn't moving.
He still coaches at Rutgers Wrestling.
But you can see the wear and tear.
He's a Jersey boy.
I forgot about that.
yeah yep well uh as i am as
well so that that was the extra little
push on like frankie's other guys so
that's that's a north jersey guy or a
south jersey south jersey we don't
consider from down here we don't like we
don't like north jersey they're lower new
york lower new york basically um go birds
uh but yeah so wanted to be the
next mayhem miller um so i wanted to
write
and that was going to be my pivot
point.
So you wrote for Bloody Elbow.
Yep, wrote for Bloody Elbow.
That actually came later on.
That came after UFC.
I had a journey where I went from
doing...
It was a small sports blog called Hit
the Ropes.
They did pro wrestling.
They're still on Facebook, I believe.
Yeah,
they're still active on pro wrestling.
MMA stuff stopped around the time that I
stopped writing.
It was me and another guy.
And then...
From that,
I ended up getting into comics journalism,
which I was like,
if there's anything that's going to teach
me how to break in,
it's going to be writing about comics and
talking to creators and seeing what their
tips are, what they're doing, et cetera,
et cetera, et cetera.
So that led me to getting a thought
on comic reviews weekly with Ain't It Cool
News,
for anyone who remembers Ain't It Cool.
And then from there,
I just started going to conventions.
I started interviewing creators.
I got to interview Scott Snyder,
Wendell Witches, like,
just came out um he just was like
not that long ago wouldn't it well that
was like two thousand thirteen two
thousand fourteen okay okay i'm thinking
about a different one because we just
released the title name witches as well
but that was like earlier this year yeah
this might be the sequel or this might
be have been like a a relaunch but
what i think it was called which is
It was that book that he was coming
out with.
He had just finished up some stuff with
Batman.
So he was getting famous.
Like that was one of the first interviews
I did.
I was at New York Comic Con.
I got to interview Mike Tyson,
like the cast of Black Sails.
Like that was where I spent a lot
of time.
Black Sails is criminally underrated.
Oh, it was a great show.
I was really sad that it was such
a short show.
three seasons man and the third season was
cut short i actually used one of their
death scenes in uh the comic series that
i wrote that was my first comic series
the six swords in our fourth issue that
we never had a perfect segue because that
was going to be next you've worked on
projects uh the six swords and kayfabe
volume three yes so the six swords was
my first creator owned book that was my
first comic i did it with two other
people i went to high school with it
was
kind of a group thing where we originally
came up with the idea.
Well, actually one of my friends,
he came up with the idea about, uh,
basically a drunk apocalypse.
This was like,
he got drunk and he's like, Oh,
what happens in the apocalypse?
And he kind of designed some ideas around
our, our friends.
I was like, Oh,
that's a really cool idea.
We should come up with a comic.
Cause like at the time,
this is when I was super deep into
the comics journalism thing.
Um,
I was doing press coordination and a lot
of events for a site called comics.
First, they'll write for any cool news,
you know, I'm doing interviews,
I'm doing all this stuff.
And that was,
the pivot point where i was like okay
this could be my first thing so we
built it around the start off of them
it's like a venture brothers kind of
homage that turned into more of a
tarantino-esque story so we did two
kickstarters for that they shot of the
dead but a little bit more serious yeah
yeah no lots of jokes and lots of
ridiculousness yeah but it was more
serious um less of kind of the
The more serious,
I'm trying to think of the word,
kind of homage is the right one.
I'm not going to think of it.
I'm not even going to try it.
Yeah.
Now it's bothering me that I can't pick
a pick.
It's all good.
We'll press.
Yeah.
As an anthology.
I did two shorts in that.
Those were the first book that I kind
of did to learn how to write comics,
learn to do a Kickstarter thing.
Spent a lot of time and money that
I will not see back for a while.
And I finally have,
I won't say broke even,
but recovered in a lot of ways.
That's the one thing about indie comics
that most people don't realize.
For a single book,
like a decent book with a good artist,
a good letter, a good colorist, you know,
all that stuff,
costs anywhere between four to six
thousand dollars a pop.
And you're not making that back off your
first book.
Now,
you might make some of it back on
a Kickstarter or
But then when you start adding in the
cost of production of the book, like,
and then the goodies you're giving.
Quality of paper.
Quality of paper.
All that.
Yep.
It adds up.
And, like, when you're talking, like,
real dollars and cents,
we did a three-issue book.
Now, again, granted,
I'm dealing with two other creators.
It came to about fifteen to eighteen-ish
thousand.
Again, broken up between three people.
But that's a lot of credit.
And I did K-Fob.
I tried to come up with another book.
um,
that I had two artists ghost on me.
So I, I have,
I had a lot of issues with that.
So I took a lot of time in
between,
we'll say my last six swords Kickstarter,
um, and the mafia versus the clan.
I put a lot of times on script,
a lot of time doing courses, editors, um,
trying to rebuild my monetary value.
I got a literary agent because I don't
genuinely have a lot of time to do
a lot of things.
And I want her to push the book,
um, uh, children's book.
So I, I,
there's, I call it my, you know,
an anime, you have like the,
the training arc where the person goes
from like years old to twenty five years
old.
That's what I've kind of considered the
last like seven,
eight years of my quote unquote career
because I went from doing all this stuff,
going to like a convention a weekend,
trying to push the six swords,
being into every little book that was
going on in comics,
getting like twenty books in my,
my pull bin, you know,
listening to every little thing.
You,
If it was trending on comics, Twitter,
I was in it somehow paying attention to
it and just super deep into everything I
could be.
And then life changed, you know, family,
kids, work, stuff like that.
And again,
not being able to produce a book and
having artists ghosts on you.
I spent this time working with an editor.
It's really been one editor, Drenna Jo.
She's done a lot of work for SourcePoint.
I met her through Dirk Manning, who, Dirk,
again, I will say this in every interview.
I will probably say this for the next
thirty years of my life.
Hands down, Dirk's been the best mentor,
guide.
And if it wasn't for him,
I wouldn't be in any position that I
am currently now in my career.
And I'm not even talking just source
point.
I just mean.
Understanding the industry,
understanding how to produce a book,
how to conduct yourself,
so many different aspects.
But through him, I met Dreena.
and I worked on three or four different
scripts and books with her.
This is really the one that just happened
to make it out the gate that got
noticed,
and they got me the deal with SourcePoint.
And then I have a couple other that,
two or three others that are ready for
production, already have some art,
already have something,
because the literary agent just did not
work out.
So, yeah.
Dude, I like it.
And let's actually dive into the project,
because
I was telling you beforehand as we were
talking, I was like,
the moment I seen the title of this
book, I'm like,
we're talking about this one.
Like this is just one of those where,
and then you realize the family history
behind it and source point press who I
hadn't heard from source point press
since.
Twenty, twenty one, twenty, twenty two.
When they had that big thing at San
Diego Comic-Con.
Yeah, I actually have.
the SourcePoint Press box that they were
selling with all the comics in it.
I actually have that sitting right over
here with the books still in it.
The only thing I did was pull the
bullets back in boredom and put it back
in and put the box back up there.
That will be a collector's item one day.
Yeah, well,
that's why it's literally sitting on the
top shelf over there.
Now, granted, I do have, you know,
the Ark-Win-Savvy sitting on top of it,
Lutz X-Wing.
Just adds to the aesthetic.
Yeah, I mean,
there's just a box of Legos that I
have nowhere to put that are already
built.
I'm just waiting for shelf space to clear
up.
And then eventually they will make it onto
a shelf somewhere, but no,
it's really cool.
And so when I've learned that this was
source point press, I was like, you know,
granted,
they probably never went anywhere,
but I just hadn't seen them like on
the shelves and stuff like that.
Like I hadn't seen them being featured
heavily at comic cons and stuff since San
Diego in
So I was really excited when I was
seeing, like, oh, SourcePoint Press.
I was like, oh, nice, yes.
Because I know the type of quality and
stories they push out.
And I was really excited about that.
But this title immediately, like, just,
like, stops you in the tracks.
So what is the Mafia versus the Klan
exactly?
I'm telling you right now,
the title alone does not tell you all
this book.
don't know what will like the title alone
should just that i mean your press package
did a pretty good job well that does
a good job but i'm talking to anyone
that's like i've got a comic and it's
called the mafia versus the clan and
you're not instantly like tell me more
then i've done something wrong in my
marketing i should have mentioned this
before i apologize if i sound a little
nasally my daughter i thought it was
allergies she a hundred percent gave me a
small head cold and i could feel it
so i
I might not sound funny,
but I think I sound funny,
so I'm apologizing for that.
I can't hear it on my end,
but I know what you mean because I
literally had that for like a month back
during earlier this year,
and I just felt nasally no matter why.
It was a horrible feeling.
Then I finally found the right
decongestant that broke it up and cleared
it out for me,
and I was just like –
oh i'm like to breathe again yeah i
can breathe again like this is nice i
don't sound like a mouth breather that's
what i think i sound like now i'm
glad it doesn't sound that bad no you
don't you don't source point was gone for
a period uh i won't go into like
the details but like many independent
publishers they got hit hard with covet um
it killed a lot of really good
companies and luckily SourcePoint was able
to make it out.
That's when Dirk Manning,
if you're not aware,
for those people who do know,
he recently became the publisher and kind
of ahead of that.
I've known SourcePoint when I was doing
the Six Swords.
I actually pitched them probably like in
the book.
I got declined.
I got told no.
But I see those guys all the time
at conventions.
Great group of guys.
I can't say enough good things about Josh.
I would love to have him on the
podcast to kind of talk about that.
Oh, hey, I'll mention it to Dirk.
Yeah, see if you'd like to come on,
man.
I'm booking right now.
I got one spot left in July,
and then I'm booking August, of course.
But I would love to have him on
to talk about that journey and
specifically how he managed to survive
COVID and showing the box, man,
because I don't know if he's seen.
Hang on one second.
I'm going to grab this because it's so
cool.
Yeah, go grab it.
I need to seriously dust that show.
But yeah, that's it right there.
Beautiful.
That's very nice.
And like I said,
all the books are still in here.
All I did was Bag and Boredom,
but yeah, Little Red Ronin.
I believe that's the whole run in here.
Yeah, that was book three, then book two,
and then book one.
And then Cold Dead Hands.
Cold Dead Hands.
And this was such a good read too.
And the next one, believe it or not,
this book took off.
Like,
I think Image ended up picking this one
up.
But The Curse of Cleaver County.
Such a good read.
This is so good.
Then They Came From Beneath the Sea.
This was a fun read too.
And then Gloomhaven.
And then workhorns.
Look at that.
It's exactly what it is.
It's unicorns.
Yeah.
Oh, there's two there.
They're stuck together.
Good boy.
yeah which was really freaking good too i
think i got that whole run i can't
i can't if i saw his name i'd
remember but the artist actually looked to
do a kid book with him uh blanche
wallace and lintz i believe lintz then
this book right here was also really good
franklin and the ghost
Amazing book, Franklin and the Ghost.
This one is Gun, Taurus, and Cannon.
Yeah.
That's everything that came in their last
one they did at San Diego Comic-Con.
What's interesting about that,
and then I'll segue into talking about the
Mafia versus the Klan.
The big thing with SourcePoint now is
they're getting away from floppies.
And I'll give my little spiel.
It was kind of funny that I was
talking.
It was just the last New York,
this was the first New York Comic Con
I've been at like six years.
And it was the last one I was
at in point four.
I was talking to him and we're talking
about, you know,
kind of the industry as a whole.
And again, how COVID hurt SourcePoint.
This was where, you know,
they hurt a lot of independent publishers.
So what a lot of times would happen
was when we're making up numbers here,
you'd be an independent publisher.
Action Lab is kind of like a great
example of this and some other ones as
well.
you might pay, let's say you get,
you're going to prepay for five thousand
bucks or you're paying a page rate.
You're doing all this prepay stuff on
floppy.
Well, the book only sells twenty copies.
What are you going to do with that
other three, four thousand?
You're also out money on your page rate
and whatever it else is that you never
made back.
So all these independent companies would
take great floppy to the graphic knowledge
and they would pay money out ahead of
time or buy all these books and then
never make, you're in the red.
Anyone with any kind of math sense
that's a that's a recipe for disaster yeah
you're a hundred percent almost in the red
yeah a hundred percent like there's no way
you're gonna survive especially when covet
hit all those problems yeah source points
moved away from that um it's basically
like you create the thing and we put
it out to the world uh that's the
simplest way that i can put it and
they're all graphic novels though it's a
lot easier for them to sell graphic novel
in a store whether it's a comic shop
or Barnes and Noble or Amazon or wherever
they're selling it with a big thick book.
So for anyone interested in pitching a
store point pitches are open,
but that's what they're looking for is
they're only going with graphic novel from
now on.
It's easier to sell.
You don't have to sell multiple floppies
in this whole,
when you start getting into the math,
it doesn't make a lot of sense,
especially for an independent publisher.
Um, but as far as the,
the mafia versus the clan goes,
there's a very strong mix of fiction and
nonfiction.
Um,
And it all started because my dad was
watching an episode on the military
channel called Mafia vs. KKK.
And he had watched the episode and he
came back to me and said, oh,
that would be a really good idea for
a comic.
And I was like, yeah, it would.
So I ended up watching the episode and
it just got my brain firing.
I'm like, how can I do this?
And I know in my own family's history,
I knew there was some stuff that happened
with my grandfather and the KKK.
So I started talking to family relatives,
all this kind of stuff.
i built out a five-page script for the
comics experience intro to writing course
um and it started off as five pages
and i kind of built the structure that's
now a hundred and twenty pages whole yeah
um but that's how it started then i
kind of let it sat i came up
with an idea we'll call it the original
script um and it was a little bit
different than what i went with now
Well,
I found that I qualify for dual Italian
citizenship.
And this is where a lot of things
really changed as far as the direction of
the book,
because what was going on in my life.
So I'm doing a lot of research on
family history because I got to get
documents.
I got to prove this person never got
rid of their citizenship or this person
came here then to put together this
package for the Italian consulate.
And I'm finding there's this story that
had gone through my family on my dad's
side for a while.
It was very vague and it was very
loose.
Basically, he had a sister.
she died uh my grandfather witnessed her
die um and everyone was unsure whether the
bolt was meant for my grandfather or was
meant for his sister also was it a
lover was it someone there was there was
all these like uh it was always someone
was rejecting somebody there was a man
either rejecting my great-grandmother
felicia or augustina who ended up dying
but we were never really sure because the
only person who told this story was my
grandmother
My grandfather never spoke about it.
They only knew he had a sister that
died.
While I was going through an ancestry
scrub and this document came up that said
Augustina,
it got pinned or whatever you want to
call it,
clicked and my grandfather connected.
And it said Augustina Massari and it was
a death record.
And it was from the Philadelphia police
and it was like shot in the back
three times.
That's an execution.
What's that?
Shot in the back three times.
That's an execution.
Which is interesting because I
shot that was something the lawyer
actually used uh this ended up going from
like this small vague thing to something
that was covered like statewide and that
was actually something that the the
defense lawyer was like oh it was a
crime of passion and or it was
self-defense or something it was
self-defense and the the prosecutor was
like this was shot multiple times in the
back that's an execution um so that was
interesting that you mentioned that
because that was that was in the documents
uh so i find out her name i
show my dad he's like i had no
idea her name was augustina my dad never
said anything either him my aunt they
never knew augustina's name so it started
this rabbit rabbit hole of research and
information i am finding out that
augustina's death was this giant thing in
philadelphia um they had a procession i
can't i don't know what street it was
It's not Broad Street,
but it was one of the main streets.
There was people who were actually trying
to lynch Stone Hill, her killer.
They were trying to break the police car
that he was in.
They were throwing rocks.
They were trying to rip him out.
It was a very big deal,
and it was covered for a while.
I ended up finding a Facebook post on
the Eastern State Penitentiary page of a
picture of my grandfather.
Nobody ever saw him.
He's ten years old.
He's sitting there with his mother,
My great-grandmother,
who passed out on a chair because she
fainted,
they had brought her back to the crime
scene, I guess, to confirm some things.
And she had passed out.
And whatever newspaper was there snapped
this picture.
And it was my grandfather at ten with
glasses.
It was on the Eastern State Penitentiary
page.
We had no idea it existed.
So that,
learning a lot about Augustina and her
death and everything that surrounded it,
really inspired these little details that
I had about my grandfather and his
interactions with the KKK.
He was in the sixties.
He was down south with my dad.
They were living in Chesapeake and he had
a restaurant that he owned and it was
picketed by the KKK.
They were getting really pissed off that
he was spending time with his workers.
His workers were African-American.
He's African-American.
He was eating lunch with them,
driving them places,
just hanging out with them.
As far as the interaction,
besides those kind of like picketing and
just knowing there was issues,
my dad doesn't remember a whole lot
because he said he was like six or
seven.
So remember,
he's not going to notice everything going
on.
He said there was an incident that he
does remember where there was like a guy
and he said it's like the most
stereotypical,
like big Southern country guy you could
think of, like overall up to his,
you know, up to his nipples and just,
you know, heavy clothes.
heavy draw, that kind of thing,
who basically called my grandfather to get
out of town.
My grandfather told him so many words to
screw off.
They called him Big Yank when they were
in Virginia.
And that kind of inspired the KKK angle
of the story.
Now, as far as the Mafia,
my grandfather was not in the Mafia.
However,
as I continued to do family research,
I learned more.
He knew a lot of mafiosos.
He actually saw...
I don't know how many,
but it was at least a handful or
we'll just call it a decent amount of
different hits and stuff that happened in
Philadelphia at the time.
And I really started to better understand
my grandfather as a person and feel really
bad for him and the stuff that he
experienced.
He saw his sister's death at Penn.
He was watching people be killed,
you know, mafia hits in the streets.
So after he had the traumatic experience
with his sister,
he seen people die from mafia hits.
So he went through a lot as a
kid,
but he knew the guy named Frankie Flowers,
who is not in the mafia.
He was actually,
at least according to newspapers,
he was whacked by the mafia.
Now you can watch the videos of some
people who are still alive who will say
that never happened and the guy was never
part of the mafia.
That's
You know, I'm not getting into that,
but he was associated with the Mafia as
a bookie.
And to some level,
and my dad's not really sure,
he also knew someone who was one of
the Philadelphia Mafia leaders.
He was in charge of the Mafia,
or at least of Philadelphia for a period.
His name was the Chicken Man Testa.
I don't know what level.
My dad doesn't know either,
whether it was like first name basis or
because Italian enclaves, especially...
when my grandfather grew up,
everyone knew everyone.
Um,
or was it even associated to his sister's
death?
Um, because his sister's death was so big.
My grandmom lived in a whole other, uh,
who ended up marrying,
lived in a whole other side of
Philadelphia,
a different kind of Italian American
enclave.
She heard of the murder too.
Like it was a big deal in the
city at the time.
It was heard about by a lot of
people.
So I don't know if that had anything
to do with it, but the chicken man,
Testa, uh,
knew my grandfather knew up in there.
had some kind of level of relationship.
The bigger relationship was Frankie
Flowers, who again was not mafioso,
but he has been allegedly connected as a
mafioso bookie and was hit by the mafia.
And I say that,
and it's something my dad and I were
talking about the other day because I'm
doing so much with this book.
So my dad had got,
or my grandfather had gotten fired from a
job where he quit or something.
And he was up in New York and
he was coming back.
He was looking for a job.
And supposedly he went to Frankie Flyers
for a job.
Now,
he ultimately did not end up taking the
job because he's like, oh,
my son's trying to become a cop.
I don't want to get involved with that.
But the fact that he could be away
for like, you know, and get off,
go to Philadelphia,
get offered a position,
or I don't know if it's,
he asked frankie or frankie offered it to
him but even to have that level of
ability to have something offered to him
yeah that personal relationship that's
after fifteen twenty years like you're not
doing that with just you're not walking
into that situation without knowing this
person at some intimate level so and those
are the only two names that my dad
remembers he he said they used to walk
the streets of philadelphia and you know
hey monk how you doing and that was
my uh my grandfather mario's nickname was
monk oh hey how you doing everyone knew
everyone when they would walk
uh yeah the italian sections of uh
philadelphia my dad was a kid so he
knew people what level i'm not really sure
but taking all that information i combined
it into the story that's the mafia versus
kkk so there's a mix of things that
actually happened to my grandfather that i
learned about that i threw in there
there's i'm spoiling this a little bit and
i apologize if you haven't seen john wiki
yet they kill the dog he gets really
mad he goes out and kills people well
in my story
it's a similar way.
I use the death of Augustina as kind
of the lint pin and the pivot point
of the story to that push the character
in the books war against clan and kind
of having to take on the aspect of
everyone can say the clan's bad,
that that's a black and white,
but the mafia kind of lives in a
gray area where it's like, oh,
are you defending the people in this area?
Are they really bad?
Like,
depending on who you ask kind of thing,
he essentially has to make a deal with
the devil to get the justice that he
feels he deserves.
is owed or not owed is wrong term
but it feels is right for his daughter
who's now been killed he feels like that's
the only way to get justice because fleets
aren't working with him uh no one's
helping him and he's an italian immigrant
in the you know or the um not
a lot of options there so like hey
i gotta make this deal in order to
get justice for my daughter um kind of
thing but the
Death of Augustina, real life,
was something that just impacted my
grandfather until the day he died.
He was having nightmares,
like night terrors,
when my aunt was getting a divorce because
he thought her husband was going to end
up killing him.
My cousin remembers just kind of waking up
at night,
getting a glass of water from the kitchen,
and my grandfather just sitting on a couch
smoking a cigarette,
just kind of like dazed out.
It was something that was tough for him.
his entire life and finding out how big
it was in the city.
That's even crazier.
Like you just didn't talk about it back
then.
And it was a vague story.
Now it turns out to be like,
this was a statewide story for years.
So I hope I covered everything with that,
but that's kind of the crutch of it
is I'm taking all this family history.
I'm combining into this narrative and at
the minimum,
if you're not interested in the mafia
versus the clan as a narrative and all
the action that you can get implied from
that kind of title,
then I just can't sell you.
no i mean the pitch you gave me
in in in the email when you originally
sent it over to me i was like
we're doing this one this this is too
good and i know i love the fact
that you were able to roll in
like some of your family history and your
grandfather's history as like a homage to
your grandfather,
like a love letter to your grandfather,
you know, as like, hey,
some of this stuff is what my grandfather
experienced.
Then, of course,
you got to exaggerate some stuff, right?
It's a comic book.
You literally do whatever you want within
the pages of the graphic novel or the
comic book.
but the fact that you were able to
bring in some of your family history,
your real life family history into this
story just makes it,
it's more meaningful to you.
But at the same time,
it gives other people a personal
connection to that as well.
You know,
like that's a good buy into it.
And I'm going to steal it,
but this is a hundred percent like a
love letter to my family and to,
you know,
my grandfather and the pride that I've,
I find in him, I have in my,
he, as well as my dad too,
but like him in particular,
like my Italian heritage,
my Italian American heritage,
my pride in that is from him.
And this is a hundred percent a love
letter to him.
I've got issues and I've talked to my
aunt about this, my dad, because they,
in the process of me doing this book,
They've gone through,
I don't want to call it PTSD,
but they've come to understand their
father at a different level because
there's a lot of stuff they didn't know.
Men in that era didn't talk about what
happened to them on a personal level.
You were lucky to get a hug,
a handshake, I love you,
or any of the above.
But you knew they cared about you.
And that's the one thing they always made
sure.
They may not have showed it,
but they cared about you.
Oh yeah,
they and and my grandfather's that way.
He was he was a big bear.
It was just like these details.
They just they were not talking about even
talk to.
So my grandfather had.
Three siblings.
The oldest was Augustina,
then says his brother Joe,
my uncle Joe and then him.
My uncle Joe.
I talked to his family.
He didn't tell anyone anything either.
They were actually really appreciative
that when I found out this information I
provided to them of how serious this was.
The short end of the story is there
was a man renting a room out in
my great-grandmother's house.
It was common then.
Well, my great-grandfather had died.
So my great-grandfather, Eduardo,
passed away when my grandfather was three.
So my great-grandmother, Felicia,
who spoke next to no English until the
day that she died,
had to raise my great-aunt, Augustina.
My uncle Joe and then my grandfather.
So she had three kids,
no English in the great depression.
So again, armchair historian,
she probably ran out the room to pay
her bills.
Cause she was also making wine as another
job.
My grandfather was also working,
selling newspapers at like eight, nine,
ten years old to make money for the
family.
Well,
they had this guy who was renting a
room in the house.
I believe it was like ten years.
It was around the time that Augustina was,
when I did the math,
was about seven or eight.
He probably moved in up until the time
she was sixteen.
Well, at some point,
this guy started to push his weight
around.
He was trying to block the kids around.
And supposedly, at least again,
according to the newspapers I read,
he hit one of the kids.
And that's when my great-grandmother
police was like, all right, you're out.
Get out.
So the guy left.
He saw them at church.
He tried to talk to Augustina.
She ignored him,
basically told him to screw off.
That pissed him off.
He came back to the house late.
He basically said,
there's going to be a crep at your
door.
Now, I forget the meaning of this,
but there was a podcast I did or
a podcast that did research on my aunt
when I brought it to them.
They did a whole research on what that
meant.
I can't remember off the top of my
head.
But anyway, that's what he left them with.
It's in the newspaper.
I'll leave a crep at your door.
So he goes back to the house at
some point.
He tells my grandmother, hey,
I left paperwork up in my room.
Can you go get it?
Well,
she goes up in the room to go
get it.
Augustine is in the kitchen.
He fires the three shots into her back.
My grandfather is asleep at the table
because he's ten years old.
He's been working all day.
Yeah.
He wakes up.
He sees her shot and killed.
He grabs a kitchen knife and then he
chases her murderer who has a gun out
in the street and then that's when like
they go and get the neighbors and then
you have like
the mob of the community,
trying to go out and chase, find,
and kill this guy.
There's newspaper articles I found that,
again, I got to preface this.
My grandfather's ten years old,
and he's jumping at the guy when they're
doing the police interrogation.
They're doing court proceedings.
There's articles about the ten-year-old
brother jumping at this guy,
threatening to kill him.
Even up to the point where this guy
was getting released.
He was able to get off of death
row and Basically get probation life like
twenty thirty years and he was coming off
Again,
my assumption armchair quarterback is that
he knew somebody from his you know from
the block someone from his community He
was working at the corrections facility
here the penitentiary wherever this murder
was that reached out to him and was
like, hey, man,
I
he's about to get out.
I want to make sure you're not going
to try to kill him.
Um,
my aunt says it was probably likely due
to him having a family,
not wanting to affect his kids,
but up until the point where this person
was still alive and getting out, you know,
people were still taking on my grandpa,
like, Hey,
you're going to murder this dude.
Like we know what you did before.
Um, so yeah, love letter to my family,
a love letter to my grandfather.
It's built, uh, uh,
An increase with me and my dad as
far as our dynamic.
We always have one.
But like the connection for him,
the connection for him and his sister,
like it's been a big learning point for
them to understand their dad and the trial
that he went through at ten years old
to see this murder, to see what happened,
to see this death.
And again,
to be a kid grabbing a kitchen knife
and trying to kill a guy with a
gun.
That's wild stuff.
It's kind of good that he didn't catch
up to him and kill him because at
the time, even as a ten-year-old,
he would have got tried for that guy's
murder and probably went to life in
prison.
Just because of the way things were then,
especially with his family being
immigrants.
Yeah.
You see some of the language.
What makes it weirder,
and I forgot to touch upon it,
is this guy is in his mid-forties.
my great aunt was sixteen.
He's talking about the reason that he
killed her was because she was talking to
other boys.
Like, when you start adding in the layers,
one,
I'm pretty sure the guy was like manic,
bipolar, schizophrenic,
or some serious mental illness.
Because if you look at the articles and
the interviews and the information,
the guy goes from up to down to
up to down.
One second, he's like
They call him frantic.
Another, he's, like,
calmly sleeping at an interrogation table.
The dude's all over the place.
But when you think about it,
this dude's in his mid-forties,
and he's talking about loving a
sixteen-year-old girl who,
when he started living there,
was probably, like, six, seven, or eight.
Like, I got really, like, skeeved out,
probably, like, a tame term, reading this.
Like, was he potentially, like,
a pedophile?
Like,
stuff was happening in the house my
great-grandmother didn't know about?
Like,
There's just a lot of details that I
can only look and take the information
that I'm looking at a newspaper from over
a hundred years ago.
I don't have any firsthand accounts and
just feeling bad.
I, my grandfather,
but my great grandmother, my great aunt,
she was,
he lost her life for no reason.
You know, my great grandmother,
my dad told me a story.
He's like,
I'm pretty sure I know why she reacted
this way.
Now hearing about this death,
their dog ran out to the street,
got hit by a car.
And he was like, my,
great grandmother or for him,
his grandmother was wailing over the dog,
like basically having like a mental
breakdown.
And you have to think my great
grandmother, she lost her husband.
She lost her first child.
And on top of that,
she lost her daughter and she was
murdered.
And now you were seeing your dog die
in front of you.
Like that's,
that's tough for people to deal with.
That's a sequence of events, man.
Yeah, that's,
it's wild.
And going back to the love letter thing,
this is a love letter to my family,
but I also have a part of me
that feels weird about profiting off of
something that affected my grandfather in
this way, as well as my aunt Augustina.
I can tell myself all day,
like I want to honor them and I
want to, you know,
give light to her story.
But at the same time,
it's like my grandfather was alive.
I know how much it would hurt him.
But also, again,
I say this as a positive way.
I would think if it's to just,
you know, knowing him and just,
probably making myself feel better that if
he's looking down on me, he's like, hey,
he really cares about our family.
He's done a lot of work and cares
about this story.
He's not looking at this as a money
grab.
It's like, hey,
he's honoring our family and he would be
happy,
but only in death because if he was
alive, he'd have some words for me.
which is a good segue because I want
to ask you,
so you're working with this family history
and, you know,
there's some lines in there that you could
probably cross and, you know,
you don't want to cross those,
but how did you find this balance of
honoring the truth and also building this
story of fictional narrative, you know,
because you got a good mix in there,
but you have to balance that.
How did you like, kind of like,
know where it is like okay i got
to draw the line here i don't want
to put too much out there but also
i need this to feed this narrative um
i think that the best way that i
did the best way i was i approached
it was i i did i'm saying this
not kind of tongue-in-cheek but like i did
two years of history in college and that's
absolutely nothing but approaching it from
a historical perspective
one called academic and having that
background in journalism and having to
structure story or an article in a certain
way,
I approached it in the same way that
I would approach an article,
like trying to hear other facts.
Now, is that a particular way?
No, it was like, I'm going to,
this needs to be grounded.
I actually gave an answer for an interview
is it's like pro wrestling versus MMA pro
wrestling to work.
It's staged as a predetermined event.
And the whole reason that you watch pro
wrestling is because that, you know,
it's a story,
but you're being pulled into it.
And it's wild.
And it's like, wow,
all this crazy stuff happening.
You know, he got hit by the chair,
but he was able to overcome it and
come back.
That's more like a movie.
It's like Tarantino.
There's, you know, it's entertainment.
and it's over the top,
and that's what brings it to life.
This is more like mixed martial arts.
It's not predetermined.
It's raw.
It can fumble around.
There's some fights that's like, whoa,
that was super exciting.
Other ones, it's like, holy crap,
you're just a wet blanket for three
rounds.
It's terrible to watch.
But it's raw.
It's grounded.
It has that kind of fumblingness that
makes it more raw.
I approach this kind of from a mixed
martial arts perspective.
It's raw.
It's emotional.
And to be honest,
as the script went on,
it started in one place.
As I've gotten better as a writer,
as I've gotten more into different
theological elements,
philosophical elements,
different writing style,
researching a lot how writers that I care
about and that look up to how they've
done things, I tried to intertwine those.
And really,
it was about infusing the emotions of how
would I feel as a father if
my daughter was killed if my child was
killed no one's doing anything about it
what lengths would i go to to get
my revenge would i just accept hey i
can't do anything about it or would you
know i make a pact again a pact
with the devil to go no no i
i'm going to do everything i can to
get her justice and that's the way it's
portrayed the mafia i i never wanted to
do and i say this before i wrote
this and then i ended up doing it
anyway
I never wanted to do a mafia thing
because of the tropes, the stereotypes,
and that everything Italian-American is
mafia.
I ended up doing it anyway,
but the way I approach this is more
like the godfather.
It's a cultural element.
It's an element that brings about the
culture,
but it's not anything that's glorified.
The mafia...
while they might be the people killing the
true bad guys,
aren't necessarily good guys either.
And that's presented in this where it's.
Yeah.
The gray area there that you have to
kind of stick to.
And I know for a fact,
like my grandparents,
they were Chicagoans before they moved to
Alabama and back.
They kind of did the back and forth
thing.
So I'm familiar with some of the things
you're talking about.
And those communities always have taken
care of,
those communities whether it was illegal
or illegal according to who or what but
family bonds are family bonds and italians
will take care of italians and the irish
will take care of the irish and you
know it's just the way it's yeah yeah
a hundred percent and so it's
yeah dude this i'm excited to read this
when it finally hits kickstarter and you
know i get it in my hands cause
you know i'm gonna have to get it
in my hands but um so there's a
lot of stuff that we could get into
the we can get into the bad guys
the good guys but there's really
No good guys or bad guys.
Well, there's bad guys,
but the good guys can also be bad
guys,
depending on how you want to look at
this.
So you got this moral complexity,
I should say.
Like, how do you avoid making
this a simple good guys versus the bad
guys story like because it's hard to do
because you can't really paint the mafia
as good guys because we all know from
a historical like they're not really good
guys i think they may do good in
the community to some degree but they're
not good guys and we all know the
clan are not going to be good people
no matter what you cannot look at them
and just finally go oh but they're good
people no the hell they're not so can't
do it with that one
But again...
I'd say it would just be honest.
I approached it from an honest
perspective.
I approached it from, again,
trying to take...
How would I feel if this happened to
me?
How would I react as a father?
And also, like, how would...
If this was to happen,
or if similar events did happen, like,
if you're going to make a deal with
the mafia,
what are they going to ask out of
you?
That's where I got to, like,
the theological elements.
I've already got a green light from Drina
to do a second one.
One of the reasons is Martin,
who's doing the art,
is doing a phenomenal job.
He's the perfect artist for this book.
It happened to be Providence and Luck that
I found him.
I was looking for a completely different
book.
I put up some ads on Reddit and
Facebook and stuff.
He emailed me and he sent his art.
I'm like,
you're not ready for this book that I
put the ad up for,
but I had this idea,
this script
you are a hundred percent perfect for this
one.
He's done such a phenomenal job.
I felt like I had to do a
sequel just to get him to do more
art because it sits so well.
And then taking that, that style that,
you know, again,
honest ability to tell things.
I got really into the theological element.
There's a lot of elements that we can
talk our culture clashes,
But a lot of the pieces of the
book, Mafia vs. KKK, are Protestant vs.
Catholicism.
And I don't mean that like, hey,
I'm truly saying Protestant vs.
Catholicism.
But culturally, historically,
like people always think, oh,
black people, white people, you know,
brown.
No, when the nineteen hundreds,
the eighteen hundreds,
it was about ethnic lines.
It's about your religious lines.
Like even within Protestantism,
like you were a Baptist and you were
Presbyterian.
People got violent about it.
So when the Irish came over,
when the Italians came over because they
were Catholic,
there's lots of history about how Gangs of
New York,
it's a movie based off of real things
that happened.
That's how a lot of- Criminally underrated
movie.
It is so good.
Great movie and real things that happened
with Protestants and Catholics fighting.
So taking that element of the Italian
Catholicism and an immigrant coming in,
and then the Klan being quote-unquote
Protestant.
We don't have to get into whether they're
Christian or not,
but that element of you're bringing this
foreign religion in,
lining underneath the story of the
theological aspect of Christianity,
redemption,
selling your soul to the devil.
There's a lot of parts where I really
tried to play to the medium of comics.
This
I would make a great movie.
Absolutely.
But comics is a special medium with a
special way of presenting things and
telling story where like you'll get the
issue of like a director will be like
my script suck.
I couldn't get my movie done.
So I want to make a comic and
then I make a movie.
that's not really coming up with the right
frame of mind uh aubrey sitterson he's
been doing uh that's my dude right there
yeah but but his sub stack like i
remember reading his sub stack he put up
a piece about using on his current book
uh free planet yep this is how i'm
approaching this from an art perspective
and using a medium to its best ability
to showcase x y and z that's how
i approach this are you reading free
planet
Unfortunately, I don't have the time.
I see it.
I'm like, oh, this looks beautiful.
I got to pick it up.
I think the first trade paperback just
came out.
Go get that first trade paperback and read
it.
When I'm going to get my comics,
I'll grab that.
Dude, it is so damn good.
It should be here.
I remember when I was still doing new
comic book days before I really
transitioned hard and just stop new comic
book day.
And I just focus on focus only on
indie creators and in telling their
journeys and their stories.
But I read issue one,
a free comic book,
our new
And I immediately was just like, dude,
if y'all don't pick up any other book
at all,
you have to hit a free planet.
Because at the end of the day,
what does it truly mean to be free?
Well,
that's so I will say Aubrey influenced me
in a lot of ways,
looking at his dubstack in a way.
This is like pre-release,
the way that he was approaching a book.
I think I read,
I'm pretty sure I read the same one.
I read it for a while.
He's like,
this is how I'm approaching the
sequentials.
This is how I want the art to
look subconsciously and slightly
consciously.
It didn't pose me the same way.
There's certain panels and ways that I
wrote the script where,
because I'm taking that theological
element and the,
and the character mario as he's making
decisions with the uh the mafia he's
crossing thresholds and the shadowing's
becoming darker because it's like he's
crossing into darkness or there's elements
of the virgin mary or the cross and
certain things that are set up in certain
places that martin is going to show like
there's the background of the divine and
that the character of mario is not saying
hey i i'm dismissing god i'm saying screw
god this you part took you took my
daughter from me if anything he's still
acknowledging there's a higher power but
he is so willing to get justice on
earth to get justice for his daughter he
doesn't care if he goes to hell he'll
willingly give that up and is knowingly
giving up his soul
because he feels this is the only way
to wrong the rights of the death of
his daughter.
So I try to take those heavier weights
and throw it in there.
And there's a redemption arc for him
coming, slightly.
It's not like happy ending Disney stuff.
Yeah, no, in a story like this,
you cannot expect the Disney ending.
No.
No, and there's unfortunately not.
It's not necessarily a terrible ending,
but it's not a Disney ending.
But there does need to be,
if I'm playing with themes of
Christianity,
there does need to be what is,
whether you're Jewish,
whether you're Christian,
whether you're Muslim,
the Old Testament element,
the New Testament element is redemption.
There's always the opportunity to turn
things around.
That turning around might not end up in
the best place for you,
but you have the opportunity of
forgiveness.
You have the opportunity of redemption.
And that's what I want to show once
I get to the second,
the Moppy Fish Clan too,
is to bring that full circle.
So the first book is very much based
in
I am knowingly making a deal with the
devil and I don't care if it costs
me my soul.
I am getting justice and revenge for my
daughter.
And I'm glad you brought up Martin earlier
because that's where we're going next with
this story.
So this is a black and white nor
visual style with selective color,
which is one of my favorite styles.
Like it absolutely a hundred percent.
I love this style of art with the
splash of colors,
my own personal book that I will be
writing and have started piecing together
is going to be done in that style.
So what made that the right look for
this story?
At first,
when I first came up with the idea,
color seemed right.
But as I built it, it was like,
this would be really cool.
If I'm going to do a Mafia book,
I should take it to like the nineteen
forties and fifties, black and white TV.
What would that look like?
And then I was building outside,
but I like color and I like splashes
of color.
And then I got the idea for Sin
City, like Sin City does black and white,
but there's just splashes of color.
And then as again,
I'm learning as a writer and a creator.
play into the comic medium and to make
it its strongest self i was like selective
color and then as we've been playing with
the color as the pages are coming through
sometimes i'm like ah the color doesn't
work here now i know exactly all the
pivot points of where i want color color
they're always going to be the same theme
but now they're a theme attached to
something higher
you'll notice it throughout the book why
certain things are colored the way they
are.
They're always going to be the same red.
That's the city black and white red.
But what I thought it did is it
brought another element of what makes
comics so special.
You get that next level of art.
It's a visual medium.
I think it's Chuck Dixon.
I saw an interview the other day and
it's basically you come for the art,
you stay for the writing.
In order for people to come for the
art,
I want it to be strong and use
that, what comics is so good at,
and that's visual storytelling.
And I think that just turns it up
into such, I don't want to sound douchey,
but like artistically or aesthetically
pleasing.
No, a hundred percent.
And I've always appreciated that kind of
black and white storytelling.
And then that, just that pop of color,
like,
Like, where would you want the color,
right?
A, if somebody gets killed,
you put the blood down, right?
If there's a neon sign,
you pop that neon sign, right?
If somebody fires a weapon,
you pop that fire from that weapon and
show that weapon was fired.
And it's just those simple adds and pops
of colors.
You keep the color palette small.
around the same types of colors you you
don't like go oh i'm going to throw
a pink here for this neon sign no
you pick a few colors and those are
the colors like you kind of stick with
throughout the whole book and that's like
your palette like you pick your three
color palette right and uh like i just
absolutely enjoy those types of stories
and i wish we got more stories like
that because they are done so well if
they're done properly
Dumped properly.
I say this jokingly.
This is not the motivation.
It's a lot cheaper.
It's a lot less you've got to pay
a full cover for a book.
I say that jokingly.
You've got to pinch some peonies.
There's where you pinch your peonies,
right?
Especially as an independent creator,
you've got to watch your money.
I think the problem is,
and it's an often issue with comics,
I think a lot of people, not all,
they come in with the idea of a
cinematic
approach to comics they come in with the
idea of movies you need to come in
to comics with what make like when you're
reading a novel why is the Lord of
the Rings you know The Hobbit like
universally adored throughout time because
Tolkien is so expressive in his prose the
words that he uses paints his picture that
the strength of novels is the ability of
the writer
to describe,
to make you feel and taste and hear
via words.
Comics are taking that same thing,
but you're giving prompts to an artist to
then take that and then make it visual.
And I've been using the analogy,
and I think it works pretty well,
is comics are like a football team.
As the writer, I'm the quarterback.
I'm not making the final play.
I have the ball.
I'm either handing it off or I'm throwing
it downfield.
And once I give it to my skill
player...
My skill player is then taking that ball
and doing their own thing.
It's no longer me,
the quarterback with the direction.
It's I gave it to my wide receiver.
He's then reading the rest of the field,
scanning the play,
doing whatever with the ball and making
his own play comics the same way.
Here's my script.
I'm handing it off to you, the artist.
It's your job to then interpret it in
the way that you see and to do
that as a good writer.
I have to know what is going to
one,
make the artist happy because artists,
You don't want to make them upset because
your art will look like booby hole.
It will look like crap.
A good point is that this is something
that I read in Dirk's Right or Wrong.
You don't want to make them an art
monkey.
Alan Moore, yes.
Alan Moore can put in his script
I want this many little dots on a
single orange,
and I want it to be in this
corner with Alan Moore.
But he's fucking Alan Moore.
Yeah, he can get away with that.
Alan Moore has that eye for that kind
of stuff.
He knows what he wants to see when
his words go onto that paper with that
art, with that color, with that shade.
I do not,
and I'm okay with saying that and being
like, you're the artist, you know better.
Here's how I see it.
Please interpret it in the best way you
think it's going to work because that's
your strength.
My strength is the structure, the story,
the direction, X, Y, and Z.
Yours is making it happen on the page.
So that's where I think you don't see
a lot of those color things or playing
around with things experimentally,
which is why I'm so happy to see
and hear that Free Planet is so good
because reading Aubrey, I'm like, yes,
this is what I need to do.
He's so smart, dude.
He's...
I think...
I don't want to blow smoke up Aubrey's
ass.
Because he's so damn good, right?
Yeah.
He's just one of those guys like...
Like I never heard.
Well,
I think I had seen him on a
couple of other things before Free Planet.
But Free Planet to me is like kind
of like, oh,
Free Planet just cemented him in my list.
Right.
Like I see his name now on anything
else.
I'm going to be like, you know,
it's Aubrey's.
Let me give that a try.
Because if it's half as good as Free
Planet, it's freaking good.
Yeah, it's going to be great.
and um he's very interactive on his social
media so if you at him you're probably
going to get a reply from him so
just putting it out there well i actually
uh when i was still on twitter i
i went i went his early kickstarters uh
the the the kung fu guy one uh
the pros like i backed a lot of
those i talked to him i asked him
questions i met him at a convention once
he might even remember my name i don't
know but i have interacted with him a
few times and
not in a long time i'm hoping at
a convention i can stop by and just
yeah kind of thank him like there there's
very specific points in my career that i
could go this really influenced me in this
way russell nolte uh he influenced me in
a certain way of how i approached the
business where i read it this is like
two thousand fourteen fifteen it took me
forever to get to he was always like
do you want to be a successful creator
and this is something you find from
any business person it just happened to be
he was the one who said it so
therefore it's stuck in my mind since yeah
you need three sources of income because
if any leg drops you still have the
other two to stand on and he was
like i have this business i have my
writing and i have this and this is
how i stand on it took me years
to get to the point where i had
my own business it's not a leg to
stand on but it has the future to
eventually reach that point and i got my
full-time job and then the third leg would
be comics
Well,
I can say that Aubrey and the way
that he was laying out his approach to
free planet through a sub stack,
explaining all this stuff.
This was like my most recent click in
the mind of like, yo, this is,
this is what I need to think and
approach this medium.
My more recent ones have definitely been
Tolkien.
And like,
I was a big Lord of the Rings
fan,
but like really diving into the way that
he approached stories,
the way that he views stories and,
His philosophy, his concept, his theology,
his... Just remember,
the Lord of the Rings and that whole
frickin' trilogy is a giant love story to
his wife.
Yeah, I mean,
that and his love story to his wife,
love story to kind of his faith,
and a love story to kind of his
love of mythology.
And that's something where I'm now
approaching, like, I've got, like,
Journey to the West.
I've got, you know, the poetic...
Edas and stuff in my Amazon list I'm
going to start working through because I
personally feel that's where I'm now going
to grow as a writer.
It's, you know,
learning how to do the comics, right?
But also looking at the older stories,
the Iliad,
all those fun things that you don't
appreciate as a kid to see
I have reread the Iliad as an adult,
and you will enjoy it a lot more.
The Odyssey the same way, right?
You will enjoy it a lot more as
an adult because you find yourself
relating to characters that you're like,
as a kid when you were forced to
read it, you're like, fuck that guy.
You ignored it.
Then you get older, and you're an adult,
and you're like, fuck,
I can see why he wanted to do
all that.
Yeah, that makes a hundred percent sense.
He wanted to kill that guy?
Oh, no, I can see that now.
That's understood by me.
Yeah.
So, like, right on, dude.
No,
you're picking up some classics sometimes
just good for the soul, too.
But I know we've talked about it.
Yeah.
Sorry, just a quote.
We've talked about, like,
comics and stuff.
if you're anyone this it's funny like you
see the trend where they go like this
and you start at this point and then
you basically end up coming back like when
you first start writing it's like write a
lot and read everything you can and then
you get away from it and i got
really funneled into just comics well now
that the other end it's like i need
to read a lot and i need to
read other things from other mediums and
then strengthen the thing that i'm doing
so that's where i'm at in that journey
to kind of yeah circled there sorry
Yeah, I mean,
I feel you on that one because,
I mean, my second job is this, right?
I get to talk to creators.
I get to learn different things almost
every show, right?
Like what works for one person.
I'm like, oh,
I might give that part of that a
try because I kind of like what you're
doing there.
You know, I'm not telling them this,
obviously, but down here, I'm like...
And that's a good fucking idea right
there.
Let me get that.
You know, and it's just, you take those,
those tidbits of information.
You kind of look like,
can you apply them to what you want
and what you want to do?
Like, how does it,
it may work for them.
It may not work for you, but Hey,
you're going to roll the dice.
You're going to try it yourself as well.
And, um, but no, Aubrey has been like,
I,
You can go back and you go find
where I talked about Free Planet,
number one on the podcast,
and go see everything I had to say
about that book.
And I have been like the dude going,
hey, if you're not reading Free Planet,
you're cheating yourself,
especially in the world we live in today.
Well,
now that I know there's a trade paperback
when I go to pick my son to
get his pulled in,
I'm going to see if the trade's there
and I'm going to pick it up because
I am genuinely excited hearing that.
No,
I do believe they dropped the first like
just like a month ago, maybe.
But earlier you talked about Martin,
who was your artist.
But you also have Dave Lentz as your
letter.
And I think Dreena.
is your editor on this and that's kind
of like especially drina as your editor is
really like putting that final stamp i'm
like okay now this is ready for production
and they're also the person that kind of
like hey what the hell is this you
know like i see what you're trying to
do here but i think you were trying
to do this like you need to get
that
to here but you've got to clean up
some stuff right here and kind of like
how did that whole team kind of help
shape this book into what it is or
what it will be when it you know
is ready to go funny that you'd say
that because uh because drina does a lot
of work with joe or three does a
lot of work with drina uh
Dreena's been his editor on a lot of
projects, and he named her The Boss.
So we always joked about The Boss.
A good editor should be called The Boss.
I've taken that on.
It's appropriate.
I called her the same thing, The Boss.
That's like an inside joke about Dreena.
We're not talking Bruce Springsteen here.
We're talking Dreena Jo, okay?
Yeah.
So Dreena's great.
I met her at a convention with Dirk.
We started talking, and then as I started,
this is probably like
two thousand seventeen eighteen ish as I'm
starting to build off these projects I'm
like the next level for me as an
artist is I whether I like it or
not I need to pay the extra money
for an editor that's going to take me
to the next level so I reached out
to her you know we kept in touch
you know she liked my ideas etc etc
and she took me on and I feel
really good because I know Dreena doesn't
take everyone on it was a combination of
professionalism how I carried myself and
then you know just
lots of other little things that I had
done that noticed her.
And she was like, yeah,
I'd love to work with you.
And since then,
she's been on a children's book that we
have ready to go.
We have pitch pitch pages done, uh,
with an artist.
He's the artist or Fred or his name's
Fred's dressing.
He's the artist or Rick and Morty.
We have like six to eight.
Yeah.
Fred's great.
So we're just we got to find a
home for that.
That'll be potentially a source point book
in the future.
We'll see.
Fingers crossed if I pitch it.
She worked on that script with me.
She worked on the Mafia versus the Klan.
She worked on another script called
Spirit.
It's a supernatural book.
Most a lot of supernatural books,
you know,
they're focused on a mature audience.
I've described it as the anime soul eater.
meets Mike Magnola's BPRD.
But it's focused on teens.
BPRD is so good.
Oh, he's fantastic.
I already liked him before,
but now I went from like,
I like you to holy crap,
I love you, you're amazing.
My level of fandom for him has greatly
increased after this documentary.
But talking to,
at the time it was my agent,
and then talking to Dark who I was
doing some consulting with,
He was like, hey,
all these books that everyone does are
supernatural books.
They're always focused on adults.
Why not focus on teens?
Like something that your daughter would be
comfortable.
Because sometimes you get a lot of
sexuality, a lot of adult themes.
And like, you know, I was a kid.
I read stuff I shouldn't have done.
But if you're going to market it, like,
why not make it directly for teens?
Yeah, young adult teens, yeah.
Young adults, PG-XIII.
So that's how that developed.
Adrena's been on that.
We're actually revamping the script a
little bit.
trying to get that as my next project
for next year.
Um, but she's great.
She's logged the feedback, uh, every,
every page that Martin goes through.
So the way that the process works is
Martin will send me a thumbnail,
a general concept for the page.
I'll go, cool, let's do it.
He sends me a finished page.
I look at it.
I send it to Drina.
She either okays it.
It goes, Hey, change this, fix that,
whatever we okay.
It, he okays it.
He moves on to the next one for
the script.
I mean,
She's been fantastic.
She's really helped me direct things.
Writing is so much of a funnel and
you get so lost in what you are
doing and your own little isms and your
own little bubble.
You need that outside voice,
but you need an outside voice that you
trust and that has, again, good vision.
Adding to the football metaphor,
you're the quarterback.
You can only see so much of the
field.
You have one spot.
Your head coach,
your offensive coordinator,
the people on the sidelines,
they have a whole other vision of the
reads, the way the defense is reacting.
Literally there to kind of like, hey,
dude, where are you at with this?
Where do you do it?
To make sure you're on the topic you're
supposed to be on.
Be on topic.
That doesn't make sense.
Or, you know,
how is this needle threading here?
There's so many elements of having that
outside voice.
And Trina,
she doesn't talk about she's worked in
other industries,
editing and doing scripts and stuff like
that.
She has a lot of experience that she
will never tell anyone about.
But being able to spend that time with
her and learn from her and the fact
that she likes working with me,
she likes my work.
She says good things about me.
Makes me feel really good because it's
like, oh,
she's worked with some really up there
people.
And to have her give me her stamp,
that helps.
Like I said,
every time I come up with a project,
she goes, ah, it doesn't make sense.
I don't like that.
And she's been brutally honest with me
with some things.
Like, no holding back.
Dude, that's what they're there for,
right?
They're there to be brutally honest to
you.
And that's what you want out of an
editor.
I know a lot of people out there
can't.
Florida editor on their projects.
However,
I did an interview with Michael Williams,
who has been editor on things like the
Diary of Sweet Pea and a few other
stories.
He's also a comic book writer.
But the episode I did with him is
almost like a masterclass of writing and
editing and that kind of stuff.
If anybody out there cannot afford an
editor,
go watch that episode on my podcast with
Michael Williams.
It is a master class.
It's phenomenal.
He's wrote Wild Ani.
He's done Shark Force.
He's been the editor of Sweet Pea,
which is a fantastic book on Kickstarter
right now if anybody's interested in that
one.
It is literally just like
a master class or what it means to
be an editor and you know also having
the background as a writer but master
class if you can't afford an editor watch
that episode you will immediately learn
something so just putting that out there
because i will recommend if you can't
afford an editor put it on credit and
i'm not saying go in debt
but an editor will take you from having
a good book to a great book.
And I've learned that experience,
like with the six words,
there was three people working together.
So we're kind of self editors.
And one of my friends, he actually,
I went to journalism school with him.
He was actually one of my editors at
our school newspaper at the time.
He ended up going on to work at
Forbes, do video games.
So he was a really good editor in
a way because he had that experience,
but at the,
After that point,
what took my stories to a level that
I can say are professional grade to get
pitched?
Obviously, at least some degree picked up.
Also, again, exclusive.
I got a second book signed contract for
SourcePoint.
I'm not going to say what.
That'll come in the future.
I have two titles that have gotten picked
up.
That'll be a future interview.
To get to that point is only because
I had an editor.
If you've got to change money or find
a way or even take longer to
you know, without your work,
get the editor.
It's worth it.
It will get you from being like, hey,
I can't cross this finish line to actually
crossing the finish line on its own.
Yeah.
Even if you, like I've said this many,
many of times on the podcast,
I am here.
I am a resource.
I've literally interviewed almost a
hundred different creators out there.
I may or may not have learned a
thing or two over the last couple of
years of doing what I do.
Yeah.
Maybe a little bit.
And I've always put it out there.
Like if you have questions on your
Kickstarters,
if you have questions on your
story it does your story make sense i
have literally read several hundred or
more if you can't want to buy at
like new comic book day and that kind
of stuff but from creators just like ce
here creators like mike williams like i've
read their books i've read their stories
like i have literally read hundreds of
these kickstarters type of books and i am
a resource like reach out i have no
problems
helping, you know,
as just like another set of eyes just
to go, Hey,
I like what you're doing here,
but over here I noticed this.
You may want to go back and fix
this.
missing here is that intentional are you
planning to do a flashback sequence later
on in the story to fits this like
what's your plan there see what i did
there because flashback can fits anything
but uh no i i just wanted to
bring up because we were talking about
editing and i know a lot of people
can't edit or afford that but i do
have another interview
out there and that was a master class
like I was sitting there like no shit
I brought the notebook and the pen out
and as he was talking I'm like about
halfway through me taking notes I was like
I'm recording this I'm like I'll just
watch this back later and finish taking
notes and I literally watched it back
again later and took the notes you know
so I got like a
one of those journalist notebooks.
And it's like probably twelve pages of
notes that I took from that interview
because it was just that informative for
people.
But let's talk about SourcePoint and the
Kickstarter, man,
because I told you from the beginning when
you emailed me,
I'm excited because SourcePoint is back.
They haven't like this is the first I've
heard of them again since like twenty
twenty two.
So when you were like, oh,
SourcePoint Press, I was like, what?
SourcePoint Press is back.
Because I remember all the books in here
and I was just like,
if they're producing anything similar to
what's in this box, I'm all in.
And now that I know it's graphic novels,
you know what?
I'm still all in because let's go, but,
uh, let's talk about that, man.
How did you connect with source point
press and like, kind of what,
what does it mean to be kind of
part of their, like,
I don't want to call it a relaunch,
but it's a relaunch kind of relaunch.
Um, I know it's, it's amazing.
This is like, it's extremely fulfilling.
I am beyond thankful for the opportunity
from Dirk and Josh, uh,
for lots of reasons.
So like I mentioned before,
Dirk Manning has been my guide, my mentor,
my guy, my big brother,
whatever you want to call it from a
comics perspective, or forever.
My first NYCC, obviously, like I said,
I'm doing comics journalism because I want
to learn how to do comics.
Well, they had a panel.
It's like,
this is how you get into comics,
this whole whatever thing happened.
I mean, Dirk was one of the speakers.
He mentioned that, you know,
like most people do, hey,
I've got this book, come to my table,
come pick it up at the end of
the panel.
So I go moseying on over,
and I'm telling you,
I only had the idea to walk to
his table, buy his book,
and be gone and never see him again
in my life.
Ever.
One, Dirk's a good salesman, and two,
I end up having a lot in common
with him.
I talk to him.
I'm grabbing the book.
He's like, oh, I see your press.
Who are you here for?
Now,
I don't want to say Ain't It Cool
News, because depending on who you are,
it gives you different connotations of
Ain't It Cool News.
So I was like, kind of sheepishly, shyly,
oh, you know,
I'm here with Ain't It Cool News,
and I'm trying to get away from the
booth.
And he's like,
I used to write for Ain't It Cool
News.
I was like, oh.
really?
And we started talking and it's like, um,
I'm going to school for journalism.
He's like, I was a journalism major.
I was like, really?
It was, I'm a martial artist.
I'm a martial artist.
This whole list of things we got talking
and he was like, Hey,
keep in touch this and the other thing.
So I kept in touch with him.
It was to do a followup interview with
him.
It doesn't exist anymore.
It was called like, uh, NYC,
like after something or whatever.
He basically did like mid year, uh,
comic convention,
like a super tiny one right off the
docks of the water.
I forget whatever it's called.
So I met him there.
Relationship continued, continued,
continued convention,
doing interviews with him,
backing his Kickstarter,
paying the extra money to not only support
him on his Kickstarter,
he would have like consultation,
like I'll read your script thing.
I did a couple of those to support
him, but also to learn from him.
Yeah.
The relationship he always had.
Excuse me.
He always had this saying where it's like,
if you're going to a comic creator's booth
and you want advice,
buy their book because you're paying for
their time.
That's just a nice city to do that.
Ask them whatever you want,
but buy their book.
And that's kind of every time I made
sure,
even though we're friends and we've got a
close relationship,
You're here to make money.
I'm going to support you.
I'm going to buy your book,
and then we'll talk.
That's kind of the relationship.
I see so many people, though.
They'll go to the booth at a Comic-Con
to see an artist or a writer,
and they'll bring books with them,
which is great.
A lot of creators will sign three to
five books or whatever.
You're a fan.
They want to meet their fans.
They want to interact with the people
buying and supporting their stuff.
I'm always been like,
if I'm going to go to their booth
and I'm going to talk to them and
tell them like, Hey,
I really like what you're doing with X,
Y, and Z.
I'm going to buy something from them
anyway, because it's a respect thing.
I respect your time enough to a pick
a book from you and see, you know,
B,
I want you to sign like my books
that I brought with me.
and just have a quick like conversation
you know it's always been about a respect
thing and it's like a courtesy almost like
i'm not just going to drop a stack
comic books online you know artists is you
know table and be like hey sign this
free while you're trying to sit there and
work and make sales and that's how they
make a lot yeah um but that's how
i that's how i ended up meeting up
source point is as i came out with
the six swords
excuse me,
Dirk started working with source point for
a lot of his books.
So when I would go to conventions,
I'd go there and talk to Dirk,
but then I would meet the source point
guys.
I met Josh.
Uh, I met Travis.
I met, uh, Green and all these,
all these different artists and creators
of that time period.
And like I said,
I pitched the six swords to them at,
you know,
through whatever they're publishing.
It got denied.
Um, but I still kept in touch.
I love the guys.
I love their energy.
I love everything about them.
And it was on my bucket list.
Like I want a book.
to come out with SourcePoint.
Fast forward, you know, I know Dirk,
I'm talking to, stay in touch with Dirk.
Here he came to the publisher.
Hey, congrats.
This is awesome.
You know, and I'm just like, hey,
in the future, you know,
I'm going to pitch to you.
Like, what are you guys expecting?
He told me, he's like, look,
this is what we need from you.
You get me this.
We'll have a conversation.
I was like, cool.
So my plan coming into this year was
I'm going to get the first issue of
the Mafiaverse, KKK, made.
We're going to do a Kickstarter for
Floppy.
I'm going to recoup back my costs.
Then I'm going to do the second issue.
Same thing.
Third issue.
Same thing.
Fourth issue.
Same thing.
Then we're going to go to the graphic
novel because that's the only way
SourcePoint's taking it.
I was very,
very cognizant as a father and a family
person who's got to put food on the
table and an idiot young one-year-old who
could waste money.
That's money that goes to my family.
I can't do what I did with the
six swords.
I need to be very frugal, surgical,
and make sure that I'm making my money
back.
I wasn't going all in with this book.
Well, I start putting up pictures.
I start posting and doing the marketing I
have to do.
I got a message from Dirk.
He's like,
so when do you think that book's going
to come out?
I was like, oh, I don't know.
That depends on the question.
But he's like, look,
if you can get me a graphic novel,
I think we can have a conversation about
catching it.
So I was like, all right.
And then that kind of, it prompted a,
a long phone conversation with him about
what he needed, you know, his thoughts.
So what was SourcePoint Press's, like,
what did they want to see from you
as a writer when you did the pitch?
Because I know a lot of places are
different.
They're different,
but very similar in that regards.
You know, they want to see panels,
they want to see lettering,
they want to see your story,
maybe some of
your outline of your story, you know,
and basically they want to get you to
give them the five minute ballpark,
you know, like pitched to me, you know?
Yeah.
So anyone can look at this.
It's all on the SourcePoint website.
So you'll see like their entire like A,
B, and C. This is everything we want.
This is what we expect.
it was basically like five to ten pages
of completed pages,
so they want to see letters,
they want to see art,
they want to see all that stuff,
they want to see what is the script,
what is the direction, how many pages,
so I put together the whole thing with
Martin and Dave Lentz, who's the letterer,
you know, we got a cover,
we got our pages,
we got everything set to go,
I think it was
It was either eight or our first ten
pages.
I can't remember the exact number off the
top of my head.
So did you do a mix of completed
pages and unfinished pages as well?
No, it was our straight completed pages.
So whatever their list on their pitch
package was that they have on their
website.
So this is professional advice.
Anyone to anyone.
There's two things you will learn as a
creator.
Professionalism and money.
money is what makes everything work
because this is my analogy for comics is
writing comics is throwing money into a
fire pit.
So you throw enough money that snuffed out
the fire.
Then you start making money.
The other thing is professionalism.
I get really annoyed.
And I know other people talking to, again,
it's something I learned from professional
creators.
If I put up an ad on,
we'll say Facebook,
I want an artist for this kind of
style.
Email me at this address with, you know,
your,
Your art, I want to see your sequentials,
not covers, sequentials, and X, Y, and Z.
And if I get a Facebook message from
someone or a Facebook comment,
and it's showing me a cover,
and it's showing me this,
and it's nothing that I asked for or
followed, none of the directions.
This is the I understand face.
Yeah.
So you get it.
And that's when you are pitched to anyone,
if they say,
and I'm making something up here,
if they say they want the page thirty
and they want it in, you know,
lines and they want page twenty nine in
colors and page twenty eight in just
letters,
you do exactly that because that is what
is being asked of you.
And yes,
comics might be creative and it might not
be the same as a nine to five,
but it's still business.
It's still profession.
And if you can't follow the basic things
that they're asking for,
they can't rely on you to make a
book.
They can't rely that you're going to be
you know, on task when they're like, hey,
you have X amount of days to produce
this or on this deadline or we need
this change or whatever it is.
Those requirements are there because it
starts off with that professionalism that
this is what we need.
If you can follow these rules,
you're already like fifty steps ahead of
everyone else because no one else follows
the rules.
So whatever was on that.
They're going to be investing money into
you in the hope that they're going to
make their money back off of you.
So following instructions is one of the
simplest things.
Read the instructions.
But when you were talking about emailing
and stuff like that, I was like, dude,
I know exactly how that feels.
I first started doing this.
When I first started doing this and I
was like, hey, if you're a creative,
if you work in comic books,
if you're a writer, an artist, an editor,
you know, a pencil or an inker,
I want to have you on the podcast.
I want to talk to all these people
within the comic book world from an indie
comic perspective.
Right.
Even if it had been like a mainstream
guy, I've been like, oh, hell yeah,
absolutely.
I'll talk to you.
But I just wanted to – the first
step, right?
I want to put the podcast out there
to go, hey, I'm available,
and I want to do this.
Please come on the podcast.
And, dude,
I got not short of fifty emails,
people sending me all their artwork,
their stories.
I'm like, did we not read –
Anything in the message.
The very specific information provided.
They've seen podcasts.
Or they've seen artists, writers,
publishers, blah.
And Amelia goes,
I'm going to pitch you my work.
And I didn't.
At the time, like, I've grown.
And I say I've grown.
I've learned.
Yeah.
I...
can take those emails now and be like,
hey, I like what you're doing, but hey,
this is what I do,
and this is what I'm trying to do.
Is that what you're looking to do?
Nine times out of ten,
for those types of people,
they're going to be like, I don't know,
why the hell would I want to do
a podcast?
I'm like, okay.
And I have not seen from them,
heard from them,
seen them posting anywhere,
and I will look.
I will go back and I will look,
okay?
And I'm like, oh, well, you know,
if they would have probably did that
podcast, then they may be getting work.
They may be getting work that pays them
instead of them sitting in their house
doodling or drawing and practicing and
writing and doing these things.
They may have some jobs lined up or
they may have work lined up.
And it's just kind of like a long
way of saying, please read.
please read, please read,
especially with pitches.
Um, like I said,
anyone who wants to pitch to source
points, if we're talking,
read what they say,
they are very transparent and Dirk will
say to everyone who has been on all
the podcasts and events that he's been
doing recently since the revamp is we're
very transparent,
but please read and you'll see it all
there.
So it was really him approaching me.
Um, my wife,
we had a conversation with my wife,
you know,
we both kind of took our time.
We thought about, we prayed about it.
We did the whole like process before we
both came to the same conclusion.
She was okay with it.
I was okay with it.
So it was like, all right,
I'm all in on this.
I put up the extra money to do
a full book.
So again, a hundred and ten pages,
you can imagine it's a bit of an
investment versus the smaller twenty-two
working your way up.
But again, the whole process and
I put together the pitch package.
It got accepted,
and that's where it's been at.
But I wouldn't have that relationship had
I not taken ten years to build a
relationship with him.
You cultivated that relationship.
You bought his books.
You supported his books.
You supported his work.
It's not just him.
I'd say Josh too because I'm going to
the booths,
and they know me as a person.
They know I'm professional.
It's not just like –
Dirk's the final say because Josh owns the
company.
It's also knowing this guy's been at this
for ten years.
We know he's not going anywhere.
We're not going to get him for a
period.
And then he falls off the map.
That's the thing that a lot of people
in comics,
I feel like it's lost because it's going
back to the email thing.
Yes, comics are creative.
And creative,
we can do sunshine and butterflies and la
la la, whatever.
It's a business with money.
People's jobs, lives, food on the table,
depends on it.
professionalism, showing up on time,
you know, being on deadlines,
not acting like just a crazy idiot.
It goes a long way because they trust
you that, hey,
we're not going to get money out on
you.
And what I learned many, many years ago,
if you're given a deadline,
let's say five June.
I'm going to have it to you well
before five June.
That's just in my nature now to have
it there before that.
Because if something ain't right,
I want to know before five June when
it was due.
So if I get it to you on
the second or the third,
I'm now expecting, you know, like, okay,
they're going to look at it and they're
going to send it back to me.
And then I'm going to redo it real
quick and get it back to them before
five June still, because in my head,
that fifth is still my deadline to them.
And that's just pretty wired into me now
at this point.
We have teenagers.
They're a ton of fun,
let me tell you.
They're getting there.
In July.
Well,
mine's about to be a real adult in
between.
Who do you call an old?
I said a real adult.
I am a real adult.
I'm still alive.
Come on.
Work with me.
You're going to cause me more work and
more editing.
You're building toward the Kickstarter
pre-sum right now.
A, how is that looking?
And B,
why was Kickstarter the right move for
this project?
Or is that like how SourcePoint Press and
many other I've seen small publishers are
kind of going that route.
They will help you with the Kickstarter
process and kind of like work it that
way with you.
But you're the man up front.
It's going well.
It's a lot of work.
I've been trying to hit every podcast that
I can work.
in the process of making sure that in
the next probably month or two,
we'll have something that we can start
getting out to the comic review sites as
well.
I've got the free page up.
Having done two Kickstarters before,
part of it's called Comics Launch.
For anyone who's looking to do comics and
do Kickstarters,
Comics Launch is a great step-by-step
process to tell you everything you need to
do about Kickstarter metrics.
Here's how you build your page.
Piler,
is fantastic it's a great supportive group
i've been with them basically their
creation um so i go back and look
at the course so i've done two
kickstarters before so i've got a little
experience it's completely changed as a
medium since i last did it i'm learning
those new back end things but um going
on reddit trying to create interaction
like hey
here's our kickstarter exclusive cover
which one do you think i'm doing stuff
on my instagram same thing i've got my
sub stack going constantly enter every
interview i go or every interview i do
i'm creating a post on sub stack i'm
pushing pushing pushing if you know
anything about sales and marketing you
need to see something about one to thirty
times before someone's actually gonna buy
it so i need to make sure and
i'm glad that the kickstarter is not
happening until september
because I can build up with these
podcasts.
I can build up with review sites.
I can build up with social media.
I can do all these interactive things to
just, here it is, here it is,
here it is, here it is,
here it is.
We've got, I think we,
I opened the link about a month ago,
a month and a half ago.
We've got thirty-six,
thirty-seven followers already.
I'm trying to hit way more.
Oh, thank you.
I'm trying to hit way more.
We have, basically,
since you don't get the same,
it doesn't work the same when you do
followers and backers.
So basically, if we get fifty backers,
which I'm equating to first day backers,
I've got a whole tier for fifty,
one hundred,
one hundred and fifty and two hundred.
I think it breaks down every fifty of
free stuff that on the first day of
the campaign you will get.
So our first set,
if we get the fifty followers before
launch,
that's a free subscription annually to my
sub stack.
It's a thirty dollar value for all the
stuff that I put up.
I put up articles.
I did a whole three piece set on
the philosophy of South Park and how they
relate to the
greek philosopher diogenes i've also put
up stuff from like i've seen that before
from somebody else too it was really good
i've seen something similar to that before
from somebody else and it was really good
yeah it was hysterical laugh out loud like
people checking on me because what the
hell are you reading yeah so i do
stuff like that i did one on the
philosophy of superman
I've done one.
I'm going through one,
which is basically like using pro
wrestling as a medium of good and evil
and storytelling.
Of course,
I'm weaving in Tolkien of how Tolkien is
a sub-creation and wrestling being a
sub-creation of story and all these
different things.
It's a perfect example, too.
Oh, it is.
Like I said, that's
That's my sub stack.
It's called Master of None because I'm
good at a lot of things,
but I'm not great at anything.
I've heard that once or twice before.
Those kind of topics.
And then if we hit a hundred,
then once we hit a hundred,
then I start giving out like physical
goodies.
I've got copies of the six stores from
Kickstarter exclusive covers that were a
one-time printing.
I still have some left.
You'll get those free and tacked onto the
campaigns.
It was about building everything I can and
doing a lot of legwork ahead of time
so the day that we launch,
we're set in a really good position to
fund.
This is going to be...
the way that I make the money back.
This is a source point.
Big thing is they're very,
very pro do a Kickstarter before we put
out to the world,
because that's a way to support the
creators directly.
They take the money from the Kickstarter
all goes to me and this campaign.
They make their money off of the actual
sales.
I actually have it right here.
So we're doing a Kickstarter exclusive
cover with my friend, Vlad Klaus.
He's done image void trip.
He's done a bunch of stuff for me.
This is his recent Kickstarter.
He just did it called Digital Bardos.
He's an amazing artist.
So he is doing our Kickstarter exclusive.
He did my Sixth Swords exclusive
Kickstarter way back.
He actually did a fourth issue of the
Sixth Swords.
We never got the release.
He did a cover for a book I've
never done.
So I've been working with Klaus forever.
I love him.
He's a great artist.
I have in mind and eventually I will
check this box.
I want to do a graphic novel with
him.
I have the idea.
It's just a matter of timing and finances,
but he's a great creator.
He's doing our Kickstarter exclusive.
We've been tossing out like different
versions and thumbnails he's been putting
out.
So if anyone's seen them,
want to look on the internet.
see where those concepts are going,
maybe even have some input.
I like cover one, I like cover two.
That's the kind of stuff that's out there.
I feel like this originally was about
SourcePoint, somehow we're back on this,
but kind of circling back to the original
question.
Yeah, no, that's how we roll.
That's how we roll.
That's the common as a whole.
We start on a topic,
we get off the topic,
we circle back to the topic,
and it's just a visceral circle.
Circle, yeah.
So yeah, SourcePoint,
that was how it started.
fourth point is back.
They've got some great creators,
some great work that's coming out for
anyone who's interested in it.
Uh, there's a lot of artists that they're,
they're doing essentially like in a
quarter.
So there's quarter one, two, three, four.
They've already have that.
I think their first quarter,
they came out with five or six books.
The next set is another five or six.
They've been on Kickstarter.
There's some great stuff out there to find
that they're putting out there.
Kickstarter,
or Kickstarter SourcePoint is back.
Dirk wants this thing.
It means a lot to him,
and he really wants to push it.
Josh wants to push it.
So if anyone remembers SourcePoint before,
it's essentially the same group of guys,
just slightly a little more revamped,
going away from those floppies right there
to graphic novels,
And I think the tagline for SourcePoint
now is comics with an edge.
So if it's got an edge,
it's got a little sharpness to it,
you know,
SourcePoint is the place for you.
And like I said, there's... See,
that's why I always liked them for
anyways, because First of Cleaver County,
so damn good.
Like there's so many books in there,
right?
That were just like phenomenal.
And a lot of them,
this was their only...
show like this was it for them like
they made it to this box and that
was the last of them which is freaking
sad because i would have loved to seen
a few books in here continue going
thankfully the curse of cleaver county did
continue on through i think image it was
but it was just such a good book
and this one i remember reading it when
i got this and i was just like
i need that book like i need i
don't know who i need to talk to
but i need that book to continue and
thankfully it did and um
But yeah, I'm happy.
The joy I had when I got that
email from you and you said SourcePoint
Press,
I literally had to Google that shit.
I'm not bullshitting you.
I Googled it.
Because I didn't.
I was like, damn, they disappeared.
Where'd they go?
Where'd they been?
What have they been doing?
And then it got me excited because it
was really them.
And I could probably say that about a
few other publishers as well,
but I know they're like dead, dead.
And they may not come back.
And this is an offline conversation.
Give me whatever information you want me
to provide.
North Point has an internal communication
thing with the other creators.
And there's a podcast and media list.
Provide me the information.
I will drop your information in there.
So all the other people who are creating
stuff.
They'll reach out to you with those books.
I do know there's a magical list out
there that floats around the indie sphere
that the USDN is on.
And I always love when I get emails
from those guys like, hey,
you were on the list.
I was like, hey, that's awesome.
I like being on that list.
I have never physically seen the list,
but I do know that list exists and
it's a real thing.
It's really cool for me.
I get an email going, hey,
you were on the list.
I'm like, I'm still on the list, baby.
I'll have to talk to the...
Am I going to be too established before
long?
I'm never going anywhere.
I'm always going to be indie.
I'm always going to talk to indie
creators.
This is like
what I fricking love to do, man.
Like I get to have cool ass conversations
with people like CE about a book called
the mafia versus the clan.
I get to hear his real life story.
Dude, I get,
I get to learn about your, your,
a little bit about your story.
We had a connection that we're not going
to talk about before we even went live,
which is really cool because it's such a
rare thing within the world that we live
in that we,
you will find two people who have done
similar routes in life that we have done,
like really similar.
It's like kind of creepy.
And that's to me,
it's like the coolest thing ever.
And you just don't get that often.
So when it does happen and it's something
really cool to talk about,
we have some shared connections with
other, our other part of our lives.
And yeah,
source points press is back like dude this
has been such a freaking amazing episode
to learn about your family your
grandfather who like they don't make dudes
like that no more you know like they
just don't but before i let you go
man uh i did shoot you a message
i don't know if you've seen it but
um but tell everybody where they can find
you and follow the campaign
Yeah, absolutely.
So for anyone who wants to back the
Sixers, God, it's been a long night.
Anyone who wants to back the Mafia versus
KKK, one,
you can find me on Instagram and Substack.
I'm no longer on X,
whatever you want to call it.
I basically just stick to Instagram and
Substack.
Well, Facebook too.
So Facebook, C.E.
Massari.
Instagram, C.E.
Massari.
And then for Substack, Master of None.
Those are the places I'm at.
Those are the places I'm active at.
And if you want to back the campaign,
it's going to be Kickstarter.
You do your little URL search,
the Mafia versus the Klan.
If you're on my social media,
you'll see the links directly.
If you can't figure it out or search
it.
It's down below right now in the
description.
Your Substack, your Instagram.
I didn't include your Facebook because, A,
you didn't send me that link,
so I didn't include it originally.
But if you want to make sure I
get it after this,
and I will add it in when it
goes live again later.
Yeah, I'll send it through.
So if you want to support,
that's the best way.
C.E.
Massario on Instagram and Facebook,
and then Master of None on Substack.
This is a hundred percent a love letter
to my family.
It's a lot of emotion for myself that's
affected my family as I've written it.
I really try to stay true, stay grounded,
and make it a sense of honoring and
not something that's overly glorified,
not just from an Italian-American
perspective and hitting at those
stereotypes,
but also just from a storytelling point
because it was very impactful and affected
real people in my life.
But it still affects to this day.
You talk about generational trauma.
This was an event that had generational
trauma within my family that I know
intimately and became more intimate with
in the process of writing it.
So, you know,
At the simple faith value,
if the Mafia versus the Klan doesn't get
you excited, I don't know what will.
It is John Wick meets The Godfather.
And it's definitely if you want to support
indie books,
if you want something that's a little
different and you love good art, you know,
this is the book for you.
And I, again, I'm a little biased,
but I can't say enough good things.
Martin's killing it.
I've got a great team, great letter, Dave,
great editor, Andrina.
And I'm really happy and excited to
finally get this out in September when we
launch.
Dude, for anybody wondering,
CE will be back in September.
We're going to launch this thing the
proper way, the USDM way,
which I love to kick off Kickstarters with
people when they launch.
It's going to be a lot of fun.
Probably August,
I will be talking about September,
and you will see the September schedule
come out.
But CE will be back on that schedule.
That I promise you.
But CE...
thank you for joining us tonight and
bringing the mafia versus the clan to the
council of nerds this is exactly the kind
of creator on storytelling that we love to
spotlight here at the usdn it has the
hook it has the genre punch but underneath
all of that it has real emotional
foundation rooted in family history
justice
and legacy to the council.
Make sure you follow CE.
The links are down below in the
description.
Check out his sub stack and follow that
Kickstarter pre-launch because the more
that follow the pre-launch,
the better the rewards are on the back
end from CE and the team over at
SourcePoint Press.
And keep your eyes on the Mafia vs.
the Klan as it heads toward its campaign
and its release in September.
And like I said,
he will be back for that.
Stories like this remind us that Indie
Comets can carry history, pain, vengeance,
truth, and legacy all on the same page.
Ladies and gentlemen,
this has been the USDN Podcast where Indie
Comets come to life.
The Council of Nerds is now adjourned.
Y'all be safe out there.
Thank you.