Broken Frontier

Mike Carey helps to launch DC’s Minx line later this month with Re-Gifters. He stopped by with his daughter Louise to chat about that book, the line itself and what it’s like co-writing with a teenaged daughter (or old dad)…

Part One

Part Two

Part Three

BF: I was talking with your father about the Minx books, and since you are writing Confessions of a Blabbermouth with him I wanted to get some of your thoughts on it for a little bit. Your dad said you helped out with Shelly Bond when she was putting together the Minx Line. How was that for you? Was it a fun experience?

LC: Yeah, it was really good. Shelly had sent over a long list of names for the Minx line and we had to sort of choose our favorites and send them back. That was the main thing I had input into- choosing the names…

That sounds really dumb now that I said it out loud. [Laughs]

BF: [laughs] I’m sure it was a long list to pull names out of.

LC: Yeah.

BF: Ok, so how did you get involved with writing this with your dad?

LC: Well, I always had an interest in writing. I like to write short stories in my own time and then when Shelly was starting up the line the Minx line she had this idea that because I’m a teenaged girl I could write something with my dad. It was a good idea because I would be writing for my own age range so I might have interesting insights. And then my dad sent her some samples of my writing and Shelly liked them very much so she suggested that we co-write something.

And then we started pitching.

BF: How was that, coming up with this idea of the teenaged girl who doesn’t get along with her "new" father?

LC: I don’t really remember who came up with it first. We pitched loads of ideas and a lot of them got rejected at first. But then we started thinking about the dysfunctional family. I forget which one of us came up with it, but the idea came up about the mother bringing home a new boyfriend and the rest came from there.

BF: Now he said that you were an invaluable resource because you were in the target audience. Did you feel that this made it easier for you to start writing with this type of story?

LC: Not really. The only thing that I was really good at was helping him out with the slang. Anytime he didn’t know how a teenaged girl would speak I would help him out with that, because that’s how I talk. [Laughs]

But I guess I’m not a "typical teenager" because normally I don’t go out much [laughs]. I kind of stay home, so I know less people of my own age than people seemed to expect, but I think it was quite useful having me and dad working together because if he had a question like, " How would the main character say this?" I could tell him how she would talk and how she’d react to her friends and stuff because I’d been there.

BF: OK, now I asked you dad this, but I thought I could get a better answer from you, he said initially you wanted to capitalize on the older man/teenaged girl relationship…

LC: That was our original plan, but it sort of died once we made Jed such a detestable character.

BF: [Laughs] You didn’t want you dad writing a character like that?

LC: It was more that there was no reason to put his viewpoint in since no one was really meant to sympathize with him. In the end it became all about Tasha and Chloe and Jed’s viewpoint wasn’t important because he became more of a bad guy.

Not a bad guy in that he’s really evil, but in that his viewpoint just wasn’t that important because he wasn’t sympathetic.

BF: Was that a fun experience for you to be able to write the female teenaged characters that seem to be so diametrically opposed?

LC: Yeah it was. It really is mostly from Tasha’s viewpoint, but it was interesting writing two such different people who are trying to get on with each other but keep finding each other rather weird. That was interesting to write because it happens in school and stuff when people don’t see eye to eye and people are different.

BF: And then everyone is weird, I know. I was there before too.

LC: Yeah. [Laughs]

BF: Now, I also asked your dad this question, but since it was an older man and a teenaged girl did you take any chances and take a shot at your dad anywhere? I promise I won’t tell him until it goes to print.

LC: Well… We kind of argued a bit when we were writing, but only a bit. When I was first writing it my writing style was a bit bumpy and he kept going over it and correcting it and I said he was just like the guy in the book because he was being so overbearing [laughs]. So we argued about that, but we tended to have the same ideas about the book so we didn’t argue too much.

Thank God! [Laughs]

BF: But did you model anything in the old man after your dad?

LC: No. You’d think I would but he’s a much nicer guy than the guy in the book. [Laughs]

BF: Well, he’s always seemed like a nice guy whenever I speak to him.

LC: Yes, he is a really nice guy.

BF: He said that most of the first third of the book was him, then you took over for a bit, and then the end was really you guys writing truly in tandem?

LC: It was like that. I did write a lot of the first bit, but my style wasn’t too good so it got heavily edited. So it was written by me but heavily edited so it’s different. But I really came into my own in the second half, because my writing style improved over the course of the book. Then by the time we got to the end we were really synching with each other. But at first he had to teach me how to write because I’d never written comics before.

BF: Did you have to stop him a bunch of times and get him to be more of a collaborator than a father?

LC: [Laughs] Yeah, I had to do that a couple times.

BF: OK, well then moving forward should readers be prepared to see more from you?

LC: Yeah. We’re pitching other ideas at the moment, but DC’s been kind of slow. We pitched some stuff about 3 months ago and they still haven’t gotten back to us about whether we can write it or not. But yeah, hopefully I’ll get to write more stuff in the future.

BF: And I also hear you have a novel you’re working on?

LC: Oh, he told you about that? It’s only about 2 chapters long at the moment as I haven’t had a lot of time to work on it.

BF: I can relate to that. What’s it about?

LC: It’s about a girl with cerebral palsy. I go to this theater club that’s called Chickenshed theater: it’s really for everybody but a lot of disabled children go there and it’s trying to raise awareness of the disabled and get them more into society.

So I go there a lot and there’s a girl in my group who has cerebral palsy so she can’t talk, but she has this computer that talks for her and that’s what inspired me to write about kids with cerebral palsy and what it might be like.

BF: Very cool. Well thank you for chatting with me Louise, was there anything else about the story that you wanted to discuss?

LC: Um… not really. I’ve never done a phone interview before and it’s quite scary. [Laughs]