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Speaker 1: It's actually a fun place to hang out. Ero dot

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net A r r oe dot net. They always teach

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us in radio one thought per break. Then why are

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we shoving all of our podcasts into one episode? Not here,

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it's seventeen different podcasts. Ero dot net, A r r

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oe dot Net. Enjoy the exploration. Hello, good morning, Channon.

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How are you doing today?

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Speaker 2: I'm doing great. Thank you so much for having me.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely what an exciting time for you, because I'll tell

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you what I wish I could be in the same

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room with a bunch of other readers discovering as well

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as coming back to your writing. Because this right here,

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when I hold Keeper of the Lost Cities Graphic Novel

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number two in my hand, what's happening is I not

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only feel younger, but I feel like that I'm part

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of an evolution of amazing change. This book is so beautiful.

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Speaker 2: It's gorgeous. I mean, I am such a happy, lucky

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author here with the way that this came out, I

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just want to hug it all the time.

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Speaker 1: Well, you gotta tell me, how would he is that

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you that you digested that as the author? Because you

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go from writing words on a page in paragraphs and

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then you've got several chapters. Well, now you've got pictures.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean this was like a bucket list thing

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for me as an ad because I started out college

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as an art major, and the reason I switched was

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because I just I'm not good at drawing from my head.

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I can't get I can't get what's in my head

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to come out on the page nearly as cool as

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I wanted to. And so I realized I was much

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better at doing that with words, and so I switched

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to writing words. But so to get to have an

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artist take my words and come up with the art

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that I wish I could have drawn myself but couldn't

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is just the coolest thing, and it has I've been

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lucky enough to get to work with two amazing elisators.

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We had one work on book on Part one of

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the adaptation, and then the reason we had a second

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one is because graphic novels, especially ones this thick, are

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a task, and we realized that the only way we

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could have Part two come out within any sort of

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reasonable schedule of Part one was if we had the

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artists get started on it before part one was even done,

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And obviously the only way to do that is to

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have two artists. So I got to work with two

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incredible illustrators who both What I love is their styles

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like they match, but they're each individually their own two

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which I think is so cool that we get to

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see two different versions of their interpretation of my world

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and my characters, and yet it's somehow all matches and fits.

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And this current artist for this new one. One of

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her absolute brilliant strengths is that she fits so much

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detail into the panels, which was perfect for the second

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half of the story because Sophie goes to some scenes

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with like a million characters and tons of stuff going

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on in the setting, and she fit the I'm like,

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I don't know how she did this. I truly don't

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know how she squeezed as much into each panel as

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she did. She is a magician. Wow.

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Speaker 1: So but how does that change? It's the layout of

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the story when when you've got an illustrator that does

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go into detail like that, because as as the writer,

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does that really kind of reshape things.

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Speaker 2: You know? I mine was a bit more of a

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like high level. I realized that what I wanted to

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do more than anything was I wanted to make sure

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that these books captured the story, rather than trying to

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micromanage everything and be like, oh, this isn't exactly like

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my head. I just wanted to make sure that we

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really captured the story. So I always tried to step

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back from each scene and go, okay, so what was

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the big like emotion and like reveals of this scene?

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Are those coming through? And what was interesting was that

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a lot of times it meant that I kind of

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went in and rewrote certain parts of the text because

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it just the joke that I had written that played

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out well in pros. Especially when we didn't have Sophie's

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interior monologue the same way that we do when we're

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in the prose novels. A lot of times it was like, nope,

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we're not like because she has a lot of like

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banter and getting teased by her friends and stuff, and

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when we're in her head, we know, yeah, she knows

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she's being teased and all that, But without that insurior monologue,

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it was like, wait, are her friends being mean to

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her right now? So it was a lot of like no, wait,

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we gotta go in and we gotta we gotta change

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this to make sure we're capturing the right emotion, the

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right feel of everything, and and the rest is kind

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of letting the artists, you know, stepping back and letting

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the artists do what they do best and and blow

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me away with what they what they come at me with.

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And it was just truly an incredible experience to be

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a part of. Well.

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Speaker 1: I've always loved the way that that Sophie is not

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afraid to take on new challenges. I mean, fear and doubt.

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We all face those, and now to see it in

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pictures and to see the expressions on the face, it's like,

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all of a sudden, everything that I had in my

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imagination is now sitting in front of me, and it's like, oh,

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I can participate with this.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. And I must say, you know, I always joke

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about like, oh, my job as an author is to

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make my life and make the lives of my characters

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as difficult possible. And you know, my one of my

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readers made assignment said like I am a villain, I

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torture my characters or things like that. And you know,

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it was very interesting seeing some of the like the

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especially the big climactic scenes, the things that I put

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those you do, like having the visuals of that I

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was just like, oh, I really am mean to my characters, like,

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I'm sorry, Sophie, You're gonna be okay. You know. It

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was intense, It's very It's much more powerful in this format.

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Speaker 1: I feel, Please do not move. There's more with a

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Shannon Messenger coming up next. An unbelievable moment of being

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and author Keeper of the Lost Cities Graphic Novel Parts

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one and two from Shannon Messenger. Do you find yourself

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going on comic con now because of the fact that

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you're doing this with the graphic novels? Because now, I mean,

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this puts you right in front of a brand new

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collection of fans, and somewhere along the line, those that

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didn't have the graphic novel beforehand are going to have

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to meet those that do have the graphic novel. And God,

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I would love to hear that conversation.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, me too. I still want to be in the

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in the room for that. Now. It's been really fun.

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I have got I did San Diego Comic Con this year,

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and I got to do it a couple of years ago,

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did the first graphic novel, and it's just been so

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much fun. And what's really cool is to also hear

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from the educators who are are finding that like a

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reluctant reader who might have because the first book of

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Keeper the Whole Theories, is quite sick. But even the

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first book is I think it's like four hundred and

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eighty something pages. So you know, a reluctant reader is

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going to look at that and be like, wait, there's

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no pictures. It's four hundred and eighty pages. Oh and

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so having this, you know, a little bit less daunting

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feeling version of it that they that might give them

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a chance to kind of have that gateway into this world,

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into this story. And I've been hearing a lot that

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a lot goes straight from the graphic novels into the

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pros novels because they want to know what's going to

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happen next, and it's it's it's really fun, it's really cool.

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Speaker 1: Your color choices are amazing. I would love to know

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what kind of research went into that, because when you

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pick up this book, I mean, it pops right away.

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It's so inviting, but at the same time, it's very energetic.

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Speaker 2: Shannon, I think that might be my art major days,

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you know. And I just I love color. I love

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you know, and the World of the Lost Cities is

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incredibly vibrant, incredibly you know, colorful. It's a lot of

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crystal and jewels and things like that, so there was

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a lot for the artists to play with. But yeah,

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I mean, it's such a beautiful book. I just I

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want to hug it. I'll refrain, but every time I

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hold it, I'm like, I want to hug this book. Okay,

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now I'm hugging it.

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Speaker 1: So are you are? Are you going to be doing

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any merchandise or anything like that, because now that we

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have pictures of what our characters look like, and now

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that we have such a beautiful book that you could

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turn into a poster and a heartbeat, are you going

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to be doing any merchandise to where we can grow it,

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such as a one piece and things. And what I'm

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mean by that is is that it's it's got to

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go into animation or it's got to go into real

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actors bringing this book forward. That has got to be

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the next step here.

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Speaker 2: Oh, I mean, I agree with you. It gets a

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little triggy. We put together a really amazing art print

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that was part of the pre order campaign. What was

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really fun. I took different panels from throughout the book

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and rearranged them into and then rewrote all the text

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and so it's like a scene that didn't exist, but

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we but from existing art. It was really a fun

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challenge to put that together. So we did do that.

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But technically, Warner Brothers owns the merchandising right now, so

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I'm a little bit limited and what I'm allowed to

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put out there into the world without potentially angering the

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Warner Brothers. But the flip side of that is they

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are working on a movie. We are not in production yet.

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It's the kind of movie where if it gets green light,

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it would be you know green lighting like a two

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hundred million dollar budget. They're being very you know, slow

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and steady with this process. We're getting every single duck

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in a row to see if we can get that

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green light and go into production. But what's really cool

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is that the team behind it, the producer that I've

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been working with as she is like a force to

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be reckoned with, and she is determined to get this made.

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Warner Brothers, the team there are incredibly passionate about it.

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We have a screenwriter who's working on it that she

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gets the story in what like she talks to me

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about and I'm like, wow, I hadn't even thought about this.

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She gets the story in ways that she is perfect

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for the job. So it feels very promising. It's just

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you know, it's a slow process. It is a million

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hurdles in the way and a lot of money that

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has to come into it. So patience and the long

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game and we hope for the best. Come on, Warner Brothers,

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let's do this now.

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Speaker 1: Now. I've always been pro writer because I've always believed

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that on view from the writing instrument and unplaced can

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totally uncut. I believe that there are people that are

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sitting inside their homes or offices that are writers as well,

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but they don't have the confidence that you do to

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step forward. And so I want to know when your

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stories change like this, when you go from storytelling to

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now you've got the graphic novel, what does that do

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to your personal memories? Because now it's like WHOA, You're

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going in two completely different directions, but it's the same story.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, I feel like the pep talk that

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I have to have with myself is I have to

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keep reminding myself that each format is different and signs

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in its own way. And so the most important thing.

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That's actually why I didn't write the overall adaptation of

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the graphic novel. It was a Selena friend who did that,

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and they had asked me if I wanted to, and

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I said, well, a that takes me away from writing

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the book, which is, you know, a huge, huge thing

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to keep in mind. But more than that, you know,

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I think we need somebody who can be objective and

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who can look at this and say, you know, we

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could combine these scenes and it would work better in

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this format. And I don't know that I can be

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that objective because it's like, when I look at it,

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everything is exactly the way that I felt that it

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should be, and so how can I change it. So

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it's great to have people, same with having a screenwriter

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who can come in and say, like, this is how

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we change this into this format, and then I can

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look at it and say, okay, cool, but this isn't

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capturing this or that, and you all kind of work together,

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and it's respecting the fact that each format has its

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own way of telling the story and if you try

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to fight that, you're going to end up with something

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that people aren't happy with. You have to kind of

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embrace it instead, even if it means letting things change.

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Speaker 1: Wow, ten minutes with you is just not enough. Shannon.

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My god, You've got to come back to this show

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anytime in the future. You know, the door is always

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going to be open for you.

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Speaker 2: I would love to anytime.

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Speaker 1: Well, you be brilliantly. By the way, before we even

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go there, let's where can people go to find out

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more about you, Shannon? Because I want them to have

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your total experience because people, where as we go into

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this holiday season, are going to find this novel and

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it's going to be like a Paul McCartney moment he

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was with the Beatles. What are you talking about? So

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they got to know that there was more to you

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than just this graphic novel.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so, Shannonmassenger dot com is a great place to start.

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I'm also on social media, not as much as I

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should be because deadlines, but Instagram, I'm at sw Underscore Messengers,

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So yeah, at least to all that on my website

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as well.

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Speaker 1: Will you be brilliant today? Okay, Shannon, I will try

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my best