Daytime Ottawa on Rogers TV

Here's an interview I recently did on the Rogers Television program "Daytime Ottawa." Co-host Derick Fage and I chat about the Lulu Awards controversy, my graphic novel the road to god knows... and the launch of my new graphic novel Stargazer at Ottawa's Perfect Books in November 2010.

Lightly-Edited Transcript

TL Rader: Alright, the second half of the show coming up is jam-packed.

Derick Fage: It is.

TL Rader: You’re having an interesting conversation with Von Allan.

Derick Fage: Oh, this is great.

TL Rader: This is going to be neat. I can’t wait to hear you guys have your chat.

Derick Fage: He is a Lulu Award nominee. He’s actually been nominated for three of these awards. And these awards, as a matter of fact, are for books, graphic novels, books by women, for women. Von Allan is a man.

TL Rader: I know!

Derick Fage: So you can imagine there’s a bit of controversy around these nominations. And it’s a wonderful book. As you can see, my bookmark, I’m three-quarters of the way through. It talks about a very important topic. The main character, of course, is a woman.

TL Rader: Yeah, he was nominated in like three categories, right?

Derick Fage: That’s right. One of them being Best Newcomer. And I think that’s really the biggest, most controversial nomination so far.

TL Rader: Yeah, because one was for the character or something. So that’s, you know, but the fact that it’s Newcomer, but it’s a man.

Derick Fage: Yes.

TL Rader: Yeah, yeah, that’s interesting.

Derick Fage: So it’s going to be a great conversation. I’m looking forward to it.

[Transition Break]

Derick Fage: Welcome back to the show. I want you to imagine there’s a set of awards for comics for women by women. And you happen to be a man who writes a graphic novel, a comic, and is nominated for three of those awards. Well, there is some controversy involved. And Von Allan, the author of “the road to god knows…,” joins us on the show. First of all, congratulations on the book.

Von Allan: Thank you.

Derick Fage: And congratulations on the nominations.

Von Allan: Thank you very much.

Derick Fage: Let’s jump into the nominations.

Von Allan: Sure.

Derick Fage: Right off the bat, before we get into the book, because it must have… Did it come as a surprise to you when you found out? Because you were nominated for three awards, correct?

Von Allan: Oh, yeah. I was aware they… It’s all by popular vote. So I was aware that they were happening, and I mentioned to a couple of people online in like early August that, hey, you know, there’s a chance. Go nominate me. You know, what the hell. I suggested to people that, like, best book and maybe best character. I never thought that it would even necessarily be eligible for any of the other categories. So I’m still a bit stunned how it made the other category that’s the contentious one.

Derick Fage: Well, what’s the contentious one? What’s that other category?

Von Allan: Okay. It’s called the Kim Yale Award, and it’s in honour of a female writer named Kim Yale who died of breast cancer when she was 43, I believe. And it’s been around for a while, around 15 years as far as I know, and no man had ever been shortlisted in that category, I guess. So how I got shortlisted in that, I’m not sure, but as it’s turned out, I guess there was never anything in the statutes of that category that forbid it. It just never happened before.

Derick Fage: Okay. So if you win that award, then we could probably see this explode into even more controversy.

Von Allan: Yes.

Derick Fage: Well, let’s talk about the book itself. I had a chance to read it, and you really tackle an important issue that I think is taboo for a lot of people, but you decided to tackle mental illness. Why did you choose that particular topic?

Von Allan: Well, it was a couple of things. The really pragmatic choice is when you’re nobody and you’re trying to do a first book, you either… in comics, it’s primarily superheroes in North America, so you either do your riff on superheroes. Nobody’s ever heard of you. Why would they read it?

Derick Fage: Right.

Von Allan: Or you do something that’s personal. I used to run a bookstore. I know, regardless of subject matter, regardless of, you know, graphic novel or prose or what have you, how hard first-time books struggle with sales. So you might as well do something you believe in.

My mom was diagnosed schizophrenic when I was a kid. It meant my upbringing, I was a sort of single child — my mom and dad split up when I was pretty young — so it meant my upbringing was kind of unique compared to some other people I knew.

Derick Fage: Right.

Von Allan: And I looked around and I just didn’t see really any other graphic novels or comics tackling this subject matter. So I thought it was important. I thought I could maybe bring a bit of — maybe ‘insight’ is too strong of a word — but I had something to say about it. That’s why I did it.

Derick Fage: Yeah, you can share your personal story. I think what’s really intriguing is that you chose to do it from a female perspective.

Von Allan: Well, that was for a couple of reasons. One is I was really sure that if I did it from, if the main character had been a boy, then it would have been very clear, like, ‘hey, he’s talking about himself. Look, it’s right there. That’s him.’

Derick Fage: Right.

Von Allan: So I didn’t want to do that. The other thing is, as soon as I made the main character, Marie, female, it’s fiction. I could play with time. I could take elements that did happen in my life, but I could compress them into a narrative that actually worked for a pacing of the story. In real life, some of the stuff, really all the stuff happened in the book to me, but it would have happened over a number of years. So trying to make the narrative work just over about a month or so was a big deal when I was writing the script.

Derick Fage: Well, and her character has a best friend throughout this.

Von Allan: Yes.

Derick Fage: That’s a great support to her. Is that something that you had in your life? In your life? In your situation?

Von Allan: I did, but not so much through one person.

Derick Fage: Okay.

Von Allan: So Kelly, her friend, is sort of an amalgam of a number of different people. And that’s actually one of the other reasons why I didn’t want to do it as pure autobiographical material, because I’d have to okay this with people.

Derick Fage: Right.

Von Allan: Like, are you okay? Really? Oh, I didn’t represent you? Well, somebody’s coming at me with a knife, you know, or what have you.

Derick Fage: Right.

Von Allan: So fiction just opens up everything. It allows you to play with stuff. I was able to take some of the best elements, what I would consider the best elements of friends I had. And I didn’t have a large number of friends when I was a kid, and I was a pretty shy kid. But it allowed me to say, you know, these people actually did matter. They do help.

And when you’re going through some of this stuff, and you’re going through it alone, it’s very isolating. So just being able to hang out with a friend, blow off steam on a Saturday, or what have you, in hindsight, I had no idea how much that helped go through some of this stuff.

Derick Fage: Right. The character, obviously the main character, Marie, shows great strength throughout this book.

Von Allan: I think so.

Derick Fage: I mean, she really is a heroine. Did you find that you had that kind of strength when you were going through this?

Von Allan: No, but I mean, I think one of the things I tried to do with the book is, to my mind, the sort of the driving force is Marie’s growing up. She’s around 13 in the story. And the awareness she has, and it’s implied in the story, I don’t come out and say it, is she realizes that her mom’s messed up. She can’t solve that problem for her mom. She loves her mom, her mom loves her, but she can’t fix it for her. So Marie has to learn to let go. And in letting go, she’s learning to stand on her own two feet. And that, to my mind, is underlying everything, is the full narrative. It’s her awakening as becoming an adult.

Derick Fage: Right.

Von Allan: And it’s huge. So I mean, the strength is, it’s that awareness. And that she comes to that, I think is, to my mind, is the best part of the story.

Derick Fage: We’re obviously going to follow this story about the Lulu Award nominations and looking forward to that. You also have another book coming out called “Stargazer.” Which is very different from this one that you did. Tell us about the book coming out in November.

Von Allan: It’s about three young girls. It’s a fantasy. So it’s very, very different. “Road” is very much a slice of life story. So it’s about three girls who find themselves, younger girls, who find themselves magically transported to another planet.

And it’s funny because I wanted to do a story that was very different than “road” that actually still sort of hit on some of the same themes. So actually, what I was just saying, letting go is a huge part. These girls want to get home. Marnie, the main character in that story, is dealing with the death of her grandmother. And her inability to let go is a huge part of that story.

So when I came up with the idea, it sort of echoes “road,” but in a completely different way with a very, very different subject matter.

Derick Fage: Yeah, and I can see it too. Because being in that situation where you’ve got, you know, a family member suffering from mental illness and you’re young, you probably got away from it all by fantasizing, right? And going somewhere else.

Von Allan: I think people underestimate the power of escapism. You know, it doesn’t really matter what it is. Even if it’s crap, you know, it doesn’t really matter. Being able to, you know, on a Saturday evening, curl up with comics or watch a movie or something like that. Or as in “road,” you know, watch wrestling or something. Just to be able to take a break from stuff, take a break from your life and pull back is, I think, incredibly therapeutic.

Derick Fage: Yeah, I agree a hundred percent. The book launch coming up in November, tell us when and where.

Von Allan: It’s on November 7th at Perfect Books. It’s a Sunday. And Perfect Books on Elgin Street, 258A Elgin Street at about four o’clock and then we’ll see how long it goes. You know, hopefully lots of people, so it’ll go for a while.

Derick Fage: Well, congratulations. Real pleasure having you on the show. Really appreciate it. If you want to find out more information or follow the story on the Lulu Award nominations, you can visit Von Allan’s website at www.vonallan.com.

Don’t go anywhere. We’ll be right back right after the break.