Last Saturday, something magical happened at the Bottle Works Ethnic Arts Center in Johnstown Pennsylvania — a one-day mini-convention was held to honor a hometown hero, the legendary Steve Ditko. And because the event was organized with the cooperation of his family, I was not only able to spend time with other comic fans and creators, but was privileged with the presence of Ditko’s nephews and brother as well.

Since you couldn’t be there with me, I decided to get some of the mini-con’s special guests to share their stories here about Steve Ditko’s life and legacy. Because this is a podcast which uses food to loosen the tongues of its guests, and since there was no time during the short one-day event to head out for lunch or dinner, I brought along a Spider-Man PEZ dispenser so I could offer my guests candy. Plus I ran over to Coney Island Johnstown — in business for more than a century — and picked up some gobs — think of them as a regional variation of whoopee pies — which I handed out to some of my guests before we began chatting.

As I wandered the exhibitors area, I was able to grab time with four guests — Javier Hernandez, Zack Kruse, Carl Potts, and Arlen Schumer — all of whom had taken part earlier that day on a panel about Steve Ditko.

Cartoonist Javier Hernandez has been publishing comics through his own imprint Los Comex since 1998, His character El Muerto was made into a live action film starring Wilmer Valderrama in 2007. Hernandez co-founded the Latino Comics Expo in 2011, and created the zine You Don’t Know Ditko, an expanded deluxe edition of which debuted at Ditko-Con.

Zack Kruse is the author of Mysterious Travelers: Steve Ditko and the Search for a New Liberal Identity. His comic strip, Mystery Solved!, appeared in Skeptical Inquirer, and his essays have been published in Inks: The Journal of the Comics Studies Society, Studies in Comics, and Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction. And he also has a gorgeous Ditko-inspired tattoo.

Carl Potts began his comics career in 1975, eventually spending 13 years as an editor at Marvel, where he not only discovered and/or mentored the likes of Arthur Adams, Jim Lee, Mike Mignola, and others, but occasionally worked with Steve Ditko. he’s given seminars on visual storytelling techniques at the School of Visual Arts, Parsons, New York University, LucasArts, and elsewhere, and presented his lecture on Sequential Visual Storytelling for the con Saturday afternoon.

Arlen Schumer is the author and designer of the The Silver Age of Comic Book Art which when it was published won the Independent Book Publishers Award for Best Popular Culture Book. He’s a pop culture authority whose visual lectures on creators such as Jack Kirby, Jim Steranko, and of course, Steve Dkitko, are a must-watch on YouTube.

Join us to hear Javier Hernandez analyze the hypnotizing choreography of Spider-Man’s fight scenes, Zack Kruse explain how Ditko’s early work for Charlton held the seeds of everything the artist did later in his career, Carl Potts reveal what happened when he returned to Ditko an original page of Creeper art after he learned it had been stolen, and Arlen Schumer declare Ditko was more than just a great comic book artist, but instead a great American artist who happened to create comics — plus many more fascinating insights.

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Readercon went virtual in 2021, but because I refuse to allow the pandemic to steal from us the conversations I’d have had if we’d been able to gather together in meatspace, I arranged a wonderful virtual meal connected to the con, too. Award-winning writer Veronica Schanoes and I shared Indian food though there were hundreds of miles between us — hers from Brooklyn, New York’s Masala Grill, me from Hagerstown, Maryland’s Sitar of India.

Veronica Schanoes has published fiction in the magazines Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet, Sybil’s Garage, and Fantasy; the anthologies The Doll Collection, Queen Victoria’s Book of Spells: An Anthology of Gaslamp Fantasy, The Mammoth Book of Cthulhu: New Lovecraftian Fiction; and online at Strange Horizons and Tor.com. Her novella “Burning Girls” was nominated for the Nebula Award and the World Fantasy Award, and won the Shirley Jackson Award for Best Novella in 2013. Her first scholarly monograph, Fairy Tales, Myth, and Psychoanalytic Theory: Feminism and Re-telling the Tale, was published by Ashgate in 2014. Her collection Burning Girls and Other Stories was published earlier this year.

We discussed what it’s been like trying to write her first novel during a pandemic, why she can only read Jane Yolen’s intro to her new collection half a page at a time, how she makes sure her fairy tale-inspired fiction works even for those who don’t catch the allusions, the joy which comes from putting the right words in the right order, how Kelly Link convinced her she should take herself seriously as a writer, whether research inspires stories or stories inspire research (and how writers make sure they don’t force readers to suffer for that research), the way fairy tales take place “outside of historical space-time,” the importance of Joe Strummer and the Clash, and much more.

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This episode you’ll be traveling with me to the Baltimore neighborhood of Fells Point, where we’ll take a seat at a picnic table outside The Abbey Burger Bistro with writer Michael R. Underwood.

Michael’s the author of more than twelve books, including the Ree Reyes urban fantasy series (Geekomancy, Celebromancy, Attack the Geek, and Hexomancy), Born to the Blade (an epic fantasy serial with former guest of the show Malka Older, Cassandra Khaw, and Marie Brennan), as well as Shield and Crocus, The Younger Gods, and the Genrenauts novella series, which was a finalist for a r/Fantasy Stabby Award. He has also been a finalist for the Hugo Award for Best Fancast with the Skiffy & Fanty Show. And his geek cred goes way back, for he tells me he was taken to see Star Wars: The Return of the Jedi in theaters at the age of one, though his memories are murky.

We discussed how his tango past impacts his writing of action scenes, his early love for Star Wars and Spider-Man, how reading Joseph Campbell ignited his desire to write fiction, what he learned about publishing as a kid and how that affected his career expectations, the lessons the late Graham Joyce taught him about the best way to revise novels, the balance you must keep in mind when inserting Easter eggs into your stories, how he constructed his Genrenauts universe and why he returned to it after a long absence, the importance of found family, his advice for successful collaborations, and much more.

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Earlier this year, Karen Osborne, Sarah Pinsker, and K. M. Szpara — all previous guests of this podcast — became members of a very special club —

Karen Osborne, who recently appeared on Episode 146, published second novel Engines of Oblivion on February 9.

K. M. Szpara, whose origin story you learned about in Episode 35, published his second novel First, Become Ashes on Apr 6.

And Sarah Pinsker, who kicked off this podcast way back in Episode 1 and then returned four years later to catch up in episode 120, published her second novel We Are Satellites on May 11.

Once I realized three talented and talkative suddenly sophomore authors all lived close enough to get together for a round table where we could discuss that shared experience, I knew it was too good an opportunity to waste.

What are the joys and challenges of writing and publishing a second book? Writers can take their entire lives to get their first novels published, after which creating another novel in a year — or sometimes less — can be major pressure. After giving everything they had to the first novel — how does a writer decide what’s worth writing next? Do they fear they won’t live up to the promise of their debut, and might disappoint readers? I had a wonderful time listening to this trio of second novelists opening up about their experiences, and I hope you will too.

We chatted while nibbling on takeout from Baltimore’s Zaatar Mediterranean Cuisine, and about two-thirds of the way through, switched up to doughnuts from my favorite such spot in Baltimore — Diablo Doughnuts.

We discussed why “second books are weird,” what (if anything) they learned writing their debuts which made book two easier, why pantsing is a thing of the past, whether book two had them concerned about creating a brand, how writing acknowledgements for second novels can be strange, the way deadlines made taking time off between books impossible, the dangers of being abandoned by debut culture, the fear of fewer pre-publication eyeballs on book two, how the pandemic will affect the creation of future novels, and much more.

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The chat on which you’re going to eavesdrop this time around is unique for multiple reasons, but the one most important to listeners is that this is the first time in the history of this podcast I broke bread with a comic book guest who did not come from my personal generation of creators. Those you’ve heard me talk to before from that particular branch of the fantastic — such as Marv Wolfman, Gerry Conway, Paul Levitz, Don McGregor, and others — were all people I worked either with or beside during the mid-’70s and into the early ‘80s. But this episode’s guest, writer Tom King, is different. There’s no overlap to our comics careers, because his didn’t begin until long after mine had ended.

Tom started out in comics by interning for both DC and Marvel, where he was an assistant to X-Men writer Chris Claremont. After his comics-inspired debut novel A Once Crowded Sky was published in 2013, and after a stint in the CIA, he went on to write Batman and Mister Miracle for DC, The Vision for Marvel, and many other projects, which won him an Eisner Award in 2018 for Best Writer. Plus — and I only realized this while taking note of comic artist Joe Giella’s recent 93rd birthday — we’ve both written Supergirl stories — 43 years apart! But that’s not the only commonality to our comics careers, as you’ll soon hear.

We discussed the two questions no one in comics can answer, his attempt at age 11 to get a job at Archie Comics, how he goes back to the beginning when writing a classic character such as Supergirl, whether Alan Moore would have had the impetus to create Watchmen in today’s environment, our dealings with comic book censorship, the weird way Monica Lewinsky caused him not to get hired by MAD magazine, the differences we discovered early on between Marvel and DC, what he learned as an intern to the legendary Chris Claremont, the Black Knight pitch he got paid for which was never published, the way comic book people are like circus folk, why the current state of Krypto proves I could never go back to writing comics, and much more.

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We’re in a transitional period here at Eating the Fantastic, not yet fully returned to the pre-pandemic premise of the podcast, which had you in restaurants, taking a seat at the table with me and my guests. A new normal is slowly making itself known, as you heard in two recent episodes with writer Karen Osborne and agent Joshua Bilmes, who were the first non-Zoom unmasked faces of people not members of my family I saw in around 15 months.

In this episode, though, we have another conversation recorded using my lockdown method of attempting to match meals with my guests so we can pretend we’re together even though there are hundreds, if not thousands, of miles between us. Over the past year, you joined me as I’ve baked and shared homemade scones and pizza, or ordered takeout weiner schnitzel and sushi, my guests and I doing our best to seize those moments of community COVID-19 tried to steal from us. In this case, John Wiswell and I pretended we were sitting across the table from each other during the Nebula Awards weekend.

John Wiswell won a Nebula Award earlier this month for the short story “Open House on Haunted Hill,” which had been published last year by Diabolical Plots. He’s also appeared in Nature, Uncanny, Weird Tales, Fireside, Daily Science Fiction, Flash Fiction Online, Cast of Wonders, Podcastle, and Pseudopod. In an astonishing show of prolificacy, he managed to posted fiction on his blog every day for six straight years, which I find astonishing. I found his Nebula acceptance speech astonishing as well; it was one of the best I’ve ever heard.

John and I were supposed to enjoy specialty hamburgers together this time around, only … something went wrong, as you shall hear. Why did I end up eating a chuck roast, brisket, and short rib burger while John only got to nibble on ice cream and carrots? For the answer to that question, well … you’ll have to listen.

We discussed his motivation for giving one of the greatest acceptance speeches ever, how he learned to build meaning out of strangeness, the way writing novels taught him to make his short stories better, his dual story generation modes of confrontation vs. escape, why what we think we know about the Marshmallow Test is wrong, the reason we’re both open online about our rejections, how the love of wallpaper led to him becoming a writer, why we’ve each destroyed our early writing from time to time, what he learned writing a story a day for six years, and much more.

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My guest this time around — for my first face-to-face-in-restaurant meal in 466 days — is agent Joshua Bilmes, and the reason we were able to get together is because I learned — back when we chatted before our panel on “Using Writing Prompts and Exercises Effectively” during the virtual Balticon — that he was going to be visiting nearby. We decided to meet for lunch at Rockville, Maryland’s Mykonos Grill, which Washington Post food writer Tom Sietsema included at the end of May, on his list of “7 Favorite Places to Eat Right Now.”

Joshua Bilmes is the President of JABberwocky Literary Agency, which he founded in 1994. He began his agenting career at the famed Scott Meredith Literary Agency in 1986. His best-selling clients include Brandon Sanderson (whose fantasy novels have sold more than 18 million copies), Charlaine Harris (one of the rare authors whose writing has inspired three different television shows), Peter V. Brett (whose Demon Cycle series has sold more than 3.5 million books), and many others. I’ve lost count of the number of convention panels Joshua has been on with me in addition to the one I mentioned earlier, everything from “There is No Finish Line: Momentum for Writers” to “How to Self-Edit That Lousy First Draft” to “How to Incorporate Critique” — further proof he definitely has a handle on the way the writing and publishing work.

We discussed how the COVID-19 lockdown impacted the publishing industry, what he learned by visiting 238 Borders bookstores, the offer he’s made to bookstore employees he’s surprised has never been taken up, how writing letters to Analog led to his career as an agent, what life was like at the famed Scott Meredith literary agency, the fact which had he but known he might not have gone out on his own as an agent, why he’s had to redefine what “pleasure” means, what he has to say to people who think they don’t need agents, the sixth sense he possesses which helps him choose new clients, and much more.

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In a better world, Meg Elison and I would have broken bread together in Los Angeles earlier this month during the Nebula Awards conference — but this is not that world. And so instead, even though we’re on opposite coasts of the United States, we ordered takeout sushi to nibble as we pretended we lived in a timeline of our own choosing.

Meg Elison is the author of The Road to Nowhere trilogy, which consists of The Book of the Unnamed Midwife (which won the 2014 Philip K. Dick Award), The Book of Etta (nominated for both the Philip K. Dick and James Tiptree awards ), and The Book of Flora. Her novelette “The Pill” made the final ballots this year of both the Nebula and Hugo Awards. She’s been published in McSweeney’s, Shimmer, Fantasy and Science Fiction, Catapult, Terraform, and many other venues. PM Press recently published the book Big Girl — where “The Pill” first appeared — as a volume in its famed Outspoken Authors series.

We discussed her pre-pandemic prediction for the kind of year 2020 was then shaping up to be, how reading Terry Bisson’s “They’re Made Out of Meat” changed her life, using tabletop RPGs to deal with the powerlessness felt during recent times, the way rereading taught her to be a writer, our dual fascination with diaries, when she realized her first novel was actually the start of a trilogy (and the songs which helped her better understand each installment), why she followed that post-apocalyptic trilogy with a contemporary YA novel, and much more.

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Up until my meal with writer Karen Osborne on which you’ll be eavesdropping this episode, it had been 428 days since I’d last seen an unmasked face other than my wife or son. (Except on Zoom, that is.) Due to COVID-19, I hadn’t been able to pull off that kind face-to-face chatting and chewing since Episode 117, recorded in March 2020 with the Pulitzer Prize-winning Michael Dirda. I’m more thrilled that I can possibly convey to begin the slow crawl back to a new normal.

Karen Osborne was a Nebula Award finalist last year for her short story “The Dead, In Their Uncontrollable Power.” Her fiction has appeared in Uncanny, Fireside, Escape Pod, Robot Dinosaurs, and Beneath Ceaseless Skies. Her debut novel, Architects of Memory, the first book of The Memory War series, was published in September 2020 by Tor Books, and its sequel, Engines of Oblivion, was published this past February. She’s the emcee for the Charm City Spec reading series, has won a filmmaking award for taping a Klingon wedding, and most importantly, accompanied me on the theremin during my late-night ukulele singalong when I was Guest of Honor a few years back at the Baltimore World Fantasy Convention.

We discussed her biggest surprise after signing with an agent for her first novel, how she was able to celebrate the launch of that debut book and a Nebula nomination during the COVID-19 lockdown, what you need to keep in your head to never go wrong about a character’s motivations, how the Viable Paradise writing workshop taught her to lean in on her weird, the favorite line she’s ever written, how she wrote fanfic of her own characters to better understand them, why she doesn’t want her daughter to read her second novel until she’s 13, the way Star Trek: The Next Generation changed her life, how the Clarion workshop taught her to let go of caring what other people think of her writing, what Levar Burton means to her childhood, and much more.

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The 2021 Nebula Awards conference begins two weeks from today — but as far as Eating the Fantastic is concerned, it begins right here, right now. That’s because if this year’s event had been held in meatspace rather than gone virtual, I’d have taken this episode’s guest out for a meal in a Los Angeles restaurant and chatted with them about who they are and how they came to be. Instead, we each baked one of their favorite go-to recipes so we could nibble prosciutto bread while pretending the weekend was already here.

And now it’s time for you to do the same!

Nino Cipri is on both the Nebula and Hugo Awards ballots for their novella Finna. Its sequel, Defekt, was released last month. Their 2019 story collection Homesick won the Dzanc Short Fiction Collection Prize, was a finalist for the World Fantasy and Shirley Jackson awards, and was chosen as one of the top 10 books on the ALA’s Over the Rainbow Reading List. Their fiction has been published in Tordotcom, Fireside, Nightmare, Daily Science Fiction, and other places. Their YA horror debut, Burned and Buried, will be published by Holt Young Readers in 2022.

We discussed how they made peace with the heat death of the universe, the way their favorite endings also feel like beginnings, the false assumption things will always get better, how their award-nominated novella started out as a screenplay, their trouble with titles and fascination with trees, the many pleasures of ambiguity, how we almost lost them to mortuary science, why they’ve been called a verbal terrorist, and much more.

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