Comic Boom - Episode 4 - Engagement, Range and School Comic Con with Lucas Maxwell

In this episode I chat with writer and school librarian Lucas Maxwell.

Lucas Maxwell has been reading comics since he was very young and living in Nova Scotia, Canada. Now, he gets to promote comics and other great books to kids in the high school library that he's  managed in South London, UK for the past nine years.  He's also a writer for Book Riot, a D&D Dungeon Master and the author of a book about table top roleplaying games in school and public libraries.

Lucas' Blog can be accessed here

Links to everything  discussed, including all of Lucas' many many reading recommendations can be found on the podcast padlet.

Follow Lucas on Twitter at  @lucasjmaxwell
Host: @Lucy_Braidley
Contact: comicboompodcast@gmail.com

Music by John_Sib from Pixabay

Transcript

Lucy SB: 2:03

Hi Lucas. Welcome to Comic Boom.

Lucas: 2:05

Hi Lucy. Um, thank you so much for having me. I'm really grateful for this opportunity.

Lucy SB: 2:09

I'm really looking forward to our, our chat. My first question is, Really about you as a reader? Aan, it's not as obvious to me this time. Some of the people that I've interviewed, I already know that they read comics themselves for pleasure. Is that something you do? Are you a comic reader?

Lucas: 2:25

Uh, I absolutely am. Yeah, I, I read comics almost every day. Different graphic novels and comics. I absolutely love them. Yeah, I would, uh, consider myself a daily reader of, uh, of different types of mainly graphic novels if we're dissecting it a little bit. But yeah, I love them

Lucy SB: 2:39

And so when did you first start on that journey? How were you introduced to them? Was that in school? Was that through the education system? I'm recognized obviously you're not English. It might be a different experience and then also, you know, how did that, how did that continue?

Lucas: 2:53

I've been trying to think about that. But when, uh, I started to read comic books, I think probably like a lot of kids, I went to school every morning, in Canada, my mom would, plunk my brother and I down in front of the TV while she got ready for work. She was a. My dad was a policeman, so he was always away. He was always working ridiculous hours. So the TV was like the babysitter in the morning while we ate our breakfast. And there were two TV shows that we got to watch, before school started in Canada. And that was, one was Astro Boy and one was the old Spider-Man cartoon, the old one. Which I don't know if that was. From the seventies or what, but it was, this would've been like early eighties for me and I loved it. I loved both of those, so. Propelled me into reading, those types of comics. And from there I would, I definitely loved Spider-Man. And then I uh, the Punisher when I was probably like, probably too young to be reading The Punisher. But, uh, I think I was about eight or nine and I was, obsessed with that, character for some reason. I think because. It was very cut and dry, what he was going to do, which was unfortunately Ultraviolent, but I was obsessed with it. Um, and I was hooked from there. I loved that. And then I got into, I loved Spawn comics and, and I loved all that stuff. And, I started to read a lot of dark horse stuff, alien, comic predator stuff. And yeah, it, it never went away from me. I always, and you used to be able to, the early eighties, you used to be able to get, Dungeons and Dragons comic books, actually, and I never shut up about Dungeons and Dragons on Twitter and stuff in anywhere else. So had to, had to, uh, shoehorn it into this podcast. But, my brother had this huge stack of d and d comic books, which I only have a couple of left that I brought over uh, from Canada here to England. And I, I mean, I'm sure I could find them on eBay, but those things were always with me. And looking back at them now, the old ones that I had from the early eighties, just like stuffed full of these really cool old ads and weird, uh, advertisements and, and things on the, on the back and thing. I just, I just absolutely loved every aspect of it. Used to be able to like order. Ridiculous things from American comics. When we used to go into the states like uh uh, like ninja stars and nunchucks and stuff, we would always try to get my parents to like mail order these things off and they would never do it. And it was just weird and cool and there was all these different avenues. So I just loved the freedom of it.

Lucy SB: 5:23

So it's quite a, quite a nostalgic thing. When you read comics now, does it take you back to those early experiences?

Lucas: 5:30

Um, I don't, for some reason I have strayed away from the superhero style of comics as I'm older and I don't know what the reason a hundred, a hundred percent know why. The reason is, and I think part of it is I feel kind of overwhelmed by it because I've missed out on all this story, I guess. But I guess it is kind of a silly reason. But for whatever whatever reason, I've more gravitated towards. The graphic novels, the one that tells, more stories about real life or other things. Yeah, I don't know why, but, uh, uh, there is a nostalgia to it. I think just the act of reading a comic book, There is something about it, and even for me as a, as an adult, there is this always a feeling of great satisfaction when I can complete something fast like that. And the comics have that kind of base value for me and I know they do for students. But um, yeah, it definitely is a nostalgia to it

Lucy SB: 6:24

What are you reading at the moment?

Lucas: 6:26

I have been looking at, some American ones, called, apple Crush. There's a couple, uh, out there that I've been really enjoying like that, that, um, I've been reading just so I can promote them, better, for the students. One through I would call middle grade or for younger ages. I've been reading a lot. A because I like to, I like to be able to, practice what I preach, I guess, and be able to promote these, graphic novels to students. There's one called Frazzled, which is kind of like, uh, girl named, Abby, who just can't. Can't get out of her own ways. It's starting middle school. It's very much for students who, cuz I have so many students, like every school, I'm sure that the kids love Wimpy Kid and this one's a bit more, uh, a a bit, you know, it's something they could, they could kinda springboard off of that. The other one I really loved, Is, the Girl from the Sea, by Molly Ostertag, which, just by coincidence, I just, I love Molly Ostertag cuz she has this Witch Boy series, which is hugely popular in our school and I loved it. It's got a fantasy. Element to it. It's got an l lgbtq plus element to it, and it's just a really well written series. And I read through that and then I was like, oh, what else has, this author wrote and the book Girl From the Sea is set, very near where I grew up in Nova Scotia, Canada, which was just really cool. and that is hugely popular. It's about a girl who discovers a, like a kelp, a kelpi, uh, like a mermaid type creature, and no one believes her. And, it's got all kinds of cool themes to it, environmental stuff. and I recently discovered space dumplings by Craig Thompson, which I've been reading through, which is hilarious. What was the other one? Oh, uh, there's another one, chunky by, um, I hope I'm pronouncing this right, but it's Yehudi Mercado, which, deals with, fat shaming and, dealing with, being bullied because of your appearance. And it's met a boy with like, an imaginary friend who, and he's being pressured to play sports by his. By his father and things like that. And he doesn't want to do any of that stuff. He wants to draw comics and other stuff. So, it's just more real life stuff for many, uh, in many aspects. But, that's kind of the stuff I've been reading, recently in like, sanity in Tallulah, which I loved by Molly Brooks, which is, two girls in space on a space station that can't get outta trouble. They can't, they keep getting into trouble, but they're really, really smart and they, they kind of like try to foil this. This plot to take over the space station and stuff. It's really good.

Lucy SB: 8:46

They all, every time someone comes onto this podcast, they always talking me about, I never read any of them. And I was like, oh, no. List is getting bigger and bigger, but it all so good.

Lucas: 8:56

Same here. There's so many out there now. I'm just, that's another thing. I do feel a bit overwhelmed, but there's, it's just great to see so many, uh, comics,

Lucy SB: 9:06

So many different options. And that kind of leads me to my next question, really, which is, what role do graphic novels and comics have in your library? How important are they? And what trends are you.

Lucas: 9:18

So just coincidentally this week, my, uh,, colleague and I, were able to, very fortunately double the, the space we have for graphic novels because we, we definitely had to, what we were noticing was that, Our graphic novel section had zero face out space, And, uh, I'm someone who's a little bit obsessed with making sure that there's a lot of face out, material on the, on the shelves. That's why I kind of weed, uh, my, my collection, uh, religiously and, and kind of very, very rigorously. I have a very, strong opinion about weeding in that. I think it's, absolutely essential because what I'm, I'm trying to put myself in the perspective of an 11 year old who's coming to the library for the first time, maybe in September from primary school, and all they're seeing are spines and it's kind of overwhelming. So the graphic novels, I want them to see the covers cuz the whole point of them is that the covers are usually really cool and really, eye eyecatching. So they're essential. To our library next to our manga, section. And they represent, without doubt, if I was to right now, run the top of 50 books of, for between September and right now, graphic novels would probably be 60 to 70% of those, top borrowed items. And the books, like I mentioned, of course, Heart Stopper would be up there. Books like Fake Blood by Whitney Gardner, which is absolutely amazing. And all these different books, books like New Kid by Jerry Craft, and all the Raina Telgemeier books of course.

Lucy SB: 10:51

Yeah

Lucas: 10:52

I've made the area with the graphic novels and the mango. Kinda like the first thing they kind of encounter is they come down the steps. I've got, recently donated beanbag chair. we have a comic book club every Thursday, which is, Absolutely, uh, oversubscribed. It is just completely chaos in a good way. I have to, block off the entire seating area of the library because of the, I didn't realize how I was running it after school and then I changed it to a lunchtime, and it, by doing that, it it's kinda like tripled the, the attendance, which is a really great thing. And we just do, we, you. Drawings and stuff like that. And we do competitions and we just have, have a ton of fun and a lot of reading of comics. So it really plays a central role. I do library lessons where they're based around comics. So there's a great comic book series on the, I survived series by Lauren Tarshis out of the US which are about historical fiction. And we, like, they get them to research, historical, events. So these are always, these are comic books about, usually about historical tragedies. Teach students about them in a really, accessible way, ages 11 plus, even things like from way back, pompei all the way up to like nine 11. but it, it's in the really quite stunning, graphic novels. And I get students to research their own kind of historical events and then they draw their own comics. I make it into a little competition, so, comics since I've been there about nine years, and the comic, the manga slash comic book club was kinda like the first club I started. When I got there, we had about six death notes and that was it. And no comics at all. No graphic novels. And now, I mean, I couldn't even tell you, I should have run the numbers, but it's, we have, I've been able to, luckily hundreds, probably a thousand graphic novels, that are borrowed. Completely, consistent basis, and one of our most popular, um, mediums for sure.

Lucy SB: 12:40

And do you find that because you've got that range, you've got a real range of children and young people accessing those? I think quite often people's first thing that they would say are when they're talking about who comics might appeal to, they, it's often reluctant readers or boys. And when you sound like you've got a real range there, that could actually appeal to, to quite a lot of different people.

Lucas: 13:01

Hundred percent. Boys definitely, um, do flock to manga, I would say. but it, in my experience, you've got books like, comics like Allergic, which is about a girl who's just allergic to dogs and her neighbor gets a dog and she wants a dog, and she can, it's kinda like this heartbreaking story about. The reality of being allergic to something with a severe allergy. Books like El Deafo by CeCe Bell, books like Measuring Up, which is about a girl who enters a, uh, a, uh, cooking contest. You've got The Twins one by Varian Johnson, pie in the Sky by, Remy Lai. These are all books that in, in my experience, are heavily borrowed by, girls. And, I would say girl and like Sunny side up. By Jennifer, uh, home, which are about girls experiencing real life issues and things like that. I think, uh, a hundred percent. So boys, there are boys who are gonna borrow, my experience boys are borrowing the, the light fall series, the amulet series a lot more. But there are so many, they are great. There are so many comics out there aimed at all kinds of different experiences.

Lucy SB: 14:03

you say that there isn't there's enough challenge within collection as well?

Lucas: 14:07

a hundred percent. I mean, on the, some of the research I've done, I'm sure you've done more than me, but some of the research I've been able to do is that often comics have more complex, vocabulary language than some novels. Uh, and I'm seeing students who yes. Who generally maybe would say they don't like to read, would definitely grab a comic, and that's amazing. But also I've got what are considered, on paper, you know, the top performers in English. Uh, absolutely borrowing stacks of comics on a daily basis. They're, they are flying through them on a rate where I can't, buy them fast enough. But, they, they absolutely love them. Yeah.

Lucy SB: 14:43

That's brilliant to hear. So. Of creating a graphic novel or comic collection. If there's someone out there, a librarian or a teacher with library responsibility thinking, we really need to do more. What would you say were good starting points or considerations to start building their collection?

Lucas: 15:03

I would say, you should reach out to your, if you're a library, and you should definitely reach out to your library community to ask what's out there I mean, social media has,, is a double-edged sword, but it is an absolute gold mine for finding, appropriate, material for your library. You can all just reach out to people. The ones that are popular in our library, I have used, Book lists from the young adult, library service through the, ALA, which is called YALSA. And they have tons and tons of lists, And there's tons of lists in the uk. You can use book trust. You've got, I'm sure the National Literacy Trust has resources as well, but I would say reach out to your fellow librarians. There are tons and tons of lists out there. The thing is, they are, they are pricey. There's definitely, especially with manga, you can be really, confused. I was at least by, kind of like the innocence of the covers, compared to what's actually inside these material. I mean, that's something that we can talk about later, but it's like, it's not so much maybe with graphic novels, but my biggest advice is to reach out to the, your fellow librarians, uh, and what I try to do is I, I try to get to know the, the library users and I'm trying to build a collection that, that reflects what they want. And, um, yeah. And I feel like it is at this point, but it's constantly changing as their tastes and experiences changed. But yeah, that would be my advice for that.

Lucy SB: 16:22

And is there any, I know I've heard people flag concerns around the fact that almost the comic collection is a victim of its own success and that it. It doesn't come back into the library when people have borrowed it. It stays in, in students homes or, It sounds, so it can be quite expensive to keep on top of, especially when it's like a serialized, like in something like Manga where it's a you, if you lose one of the sort of order of the story, then the story doesn't necessarily make sense anymore. Is that something you've found or have you, got students returning the, returning the books.

Lucas: 16:56

Yeah, in my experience, we are very lucky. We do seem to have honest students returning the books. We occasionally they go missing. I do make a lot of effort to track those down because as you just said, uh, you're a hundred percent right If you have 1, 2, 1, 2, uh, four or six and in a series and it's, uh, think of like the Amulet series or, or or manga series. It is infuriating to some students and rightly. These books have gone and maybe your budget has been, spent. So I, um, I'm lucky that the, the system that we use sends out, reminders. I've got a great relationship with most the, the tutors, which, you know, everyone I'm sure has. But I, I think, I do have to try to make a little extra effort if they, they do go missing. And sometimes even it's a call home to say, can you, and usually it's just, you know, it's. Obviously polite conversations just say, look, we, we really could use some help tracking this down if you could just do one extra look around and things like that. And sometimes that does help. The sad reality is that sometimes they just go missing. We really have been super lucky in regards to the theft kind of situation. Uh, I don't know. Why, you know, I mean, it's just the way it is, but it, it isn't something that I've yet to experience, on a large, scale.

Lucy SB: 18:17

You referred to a little bit earlier on to, to some of the sort of manga specific things that people might need to take on board if they were interested in expanding. I've definitely fallen foul of, I think I recommended a book. And it was like the first, the first edition of that series was fine have any, didn't have any challenging content in, but it was know, the first of 20 and it got more serious as the series went on.

Lucas: 18:44

I see.

Lucy SB: 18:46

so what, what tips and advice do you have on, on.

Lucas: 18:48

Oh man. Yeah, it's, uh, again, yeah, you're exactly right. It, there's no kind of magic bullet for manga, in my opinion. But my advice is to read the first few, I don't consider myself a manga, fan, but I fully understand the, the popularity of it. I definitely, when I get a new, one, new series in and I, I try to read through it. The first couple, and just get the sense of it. In my experience, when you buy a certain manga, especially if they're from a company, a publisher called Shonen Jump, they will give you an age rating. You can kind of look at these on different sites where you can look at the back, like on, even on Amazon, if you Google it or look it up on Amazon, you don't need to, obviously don't buy it from Amazon. You can buy it from your local bookshop, but you can zoom in on the age rating, which you can be like a base guide. It doesn't mean you have to use that as. Gospel. But if I'm looking at one like, oh, you know, I wanna get a new series for year sevens who are 11 years old, and I kind of like, oh, what's this series? And I, and I have no idea what it's about. I Google it, I go on Amazon, and it says, it has the stamp on it that says Older teen. I definitely know that's probably even older than, than that. So it's like, uh, I kind of like, oh, okay. That's something that I've been doing. There is an amazing librarian in the US called Ashley Hawkins, who calls herself Manga Librarian on Twitter, who has a ton of lists that I use as absolute, just truth because she is, self-described, obsessed with, with manga and loves it and reads it voraciously and has provided very helpful, lists for Ev any librarian who's feeling this. Trepidation with buying it. So I can't recommend her enough. She has done, like, I wouldn't feel even worthy to start my own kind of, here's the list. I do create some lists, but, there's no point in reinventing the wheel cuz Ashley's done such an amazing job. So I would absolutely, anybody listening to this, jump over to Ashley's site. I believe her site's even called Manga Librarian, I'll dig

Lucy SB: 20:44

it and put it in in the show

Lucas: 20:46

So I would say read them, uh, investigate those lists. Again, reach out to, your librarian community and reach out to, your, if you're in a school library, your staff, because we have, some media teachers who, I've just some new new media teachers through the school who have gotten to know through different things through, Dungeons and Dragons. They've come and watched and find out that they're huge Manga fans and they've been a huge help, just by having just conversations in the staff room. And they've been really helpful. Cause I don't consider myself an expert with Manga. I supply a lot of it, but, I'm constantly learning and constantly trying to make sure I'm, I'm. Providing the right material to the right age group because as I said, you can be easily tripped by the innocent covers and inside it can be completely, inappropriate for certain ages. So you have to kind of be careful.

Lucy SB: 21:32

Yeah. And do you find in general then that. You've, your staff have come on a, a journey with, at the school with in terms of their acceptance of comics? do you think it's in, it's going into the curriculum as well? Are there young people in their English classrooms looking at comics as part of that, or is that sort of something yet to come?

Lucas: 21:50

I a hundred percent believe that, staff have, come on board. I think when I started, nine years ago, there was a big feeling from many different people, staff members, senior leaders that. Books, like even like Wimpy Kid, definitely comic books, you know, captain Underpants, stuff like that weren't real, weren't real. Books weren't really counting as reading. I was having kids being sent in. By their English teachers saying, no, miss said I needed to get a real book, this and that. And through, um, I've been very, very fortunate that they've allowed me to lead a few CPD sessions, for new teachers and for, for existing teachers, just about the importance of reading for pleasure. And in every single one of those, I, really drive home the importance of comics. I mean, I, I harken back to what I was talking about when I was obsessed with, uh, Punisher. Really, that was all I was reading for a long time. I kind of dropped off like a lot of kids do. A lot of boys especially. I dropped off with reading for a bit, but I, I still read comics, but if you asked some people, they would say there wasn't real reading. So what I see staff members, I don't, I I have much less and almost zero of that now with students coming in saying that, they've been sent back because it's not a real book or they need to get another book, et cetera. And we've been able to do things like, incorporate comics into our, uh, book award, one year. With the graphic novel, when the stars are scattered, and, it's a really amazing, tragic, horrifying, uh, story, but told in a very accessible way and that really brought it into the mainstream because staff get involved, in our book award and. They see the kids, when they're in the library, for their library lessons, uh, pouring over these, uh, these comics and these manga. And I think I've been pretty successful thankfully, in, bringing everybody around on the, on that front. But it's, no, it was no easy feat. It's taken probably nine years, in my opinion to do that.

Lucy SB: 23:43

Wow. And a lot of determination. drip approach. It sounds

Lucas: 23:48

Yes. Yeah,

Lucy SB: 23:50

I've heard you speak before, about a comicon event that you've had in your library and I would really, really love to know a little bit more about those events and how that works.

Lucas: 24:02

It kind of stemmed from that, that thing when I just talked about, I did like most schools, you kind of take part in World Book Day and I had a very vivid memory my first World book day. A kid came in the library dressed like Spider-Man and a teacher kind of made a comment, not to them, but to me, like, oh, it's not a real, they shouldn't be doing that, because it's not really. There was one of those things where they were making a comment about comics, and I kind of kept my mouth shut in that moment. But, um, again, I've sparked a thing in my head where I was saying, oh, I should do a little another event for the kids who feel let. Maybe they've been told this, maybe someone else has made a comment to that kid, or maybe somebody else felt like, well, I can't come dressed up because of, of this, uh, kind of stigma or whatever. I don't know if that is true or not, but I just, it kind of, that comment from that teacher made me think about this. So I started a, uh, a Saturday Comic-Con. And it's been going for quite a few years now, and our library is hugely, successful, which is great. Uh, I didn't know, have a clue if anybody would show up because it is a Saturday. But they always come in droves and the, the whole thing is they don't have to dress up at all. But the options there, if they wanna dress up as a manga or comic book, character, they're absolutely welcome to do so. And it usually runs from like 10:00 AM to two. And I, I always do it on my own and I always, but I always promote it to everybody. And inevitably, I, I've really had, uh, a bit lucky every year I've had teachers and TAs and their families come and they end up obviously like volunteering to help, which is amazing. I have snacks and, and games and I always bring. A, uh, a guest, illustrator. So we had, Sonya Leong she has created a bunch of, Shakespeare adaptations Manga and yeah. Uh, really cool stuff and other, and other, comics. Other manga I should say. and she just did an absolutely brilliant, workshop and that's what I do. So we have big quiz, you know, manga slash comic quiz with prizes. We have the food, as I said. We have craft, so they, I usually hire like a badge maker where they can make their own badges. And really it's just like four hours of really laid back. I have everything set up in stations so they can kind of just wander around. We usually have about 50 to a hundred kids show up throughout the day. Yeah, it's good. And they, they sign up, but the library's open and it's just really cool. And they know when the, the illustrator's coming, that's gonna be like from, let's say one to two, that'll be like the big finale. So if anybody wants to come for that, but sometimes we have like 80, 90 kids kind of crammed in the library on like tables and makeshift tables. That's just the nature of the space. We don't have room for everyone, but they're all doing this, this comic book workshop, which is amazing. And they end up drawing all kinds of great things and getting things signed by the author and, um, Yeah, for a Saturday program. It's really fun and I, I love doing it. So we do it in March every year, and I, yeah, every year I just try to make it bigger and better using different, games and activities and stuff like that. And there's always prizes, so they usually, they absolutely love it.

Lucy SB: 27:09

is free? of charge for the students is or is there like A small

Lucas: 27:14

a hundred percent free. No, a free. Yeah. I never charge. Yeah.

Lucy SB: 27:21

You've spoken a lot. It's really clear, I think from, from what you've been saying that you really sort of tune into your students and what they want and, you know, listening to them. Do you capture that sort of student voice formally or is it just informal and do you have kind of pupil librarians set up how do you get students actively involved in the library?

Lucas: 27:41

No, that's a good question. we definitely have student librarians. We have 10 student assistant librarians who, work on a rotational basis. And they, they're very fluid in that they, they do have a strict schedule to work behind the desk. and they love doing that cuz it gives them the power of stamping books in and out. But they also are very, fluid in what I mean by that is they, they're always called upon or asked if they want to. To do many different things that could be interview an author, when they come. That could be to, host an event to. We do like a Lego judging competition for our, like our makerspace club. and they judge it and all these different things. I try to capture student voice through our book review system in one way. And it is kind of informal. Uh, we do an open mic once a month with, with a partnership with the music department. And we have student hosts. We have students who, are always, regulars who always like start the show. and we have this, really core Dungeons and Dragons group, and they are very vocal about their love of that. And my approach is really to just. Try to give every student a feeling that they own the library. Of course I'm there, my colleagues there to oversee everything, but really it's their space, not my space. It's theirs. And that's why I think we have so many different students come in because there's so many different things that we've, we're able to. Do and with comics, in the comic book club, we have like year elevens. Year twelves. In the, in the past, run the club, run events, ask if they could run these types of clubs. And that's all stemmed through our student library program that has been going for about nine years now.

Lucy SB: 29:23

And do any of their comics that they create in comic club ever end up in the library collection? Is there an opportunity for students writing to appear as well?

Lucas: 29:32

That's a very good question. And when I, so I used to work in the public library in Canada, and I used to run these zine making workshops. there was a, uh, there was a group that used to do zines and for anybody listening who's maybe not as old as me, you know, hopefully this does not sound condescending. A zine is like basically short for magazine. It's just like a homemade magazine.

Lucy SB: 29:51

a photocopied magazine, but scenes are edgy and cool. They're not old. Um, or maybe I

Lucas: 29:57

edgy and cool. I never,

Lucy SB: 29:58

It's just on

Lucas: 29:59

time I talk, every time I talk to younger people, I assume, like I just assume I'm the ancient person because I. Zines. I think they started with like punk rock, which was a little bit before my time. I'm not that old, they were way to spread spread news and we, we made them in the public library and I was able to get them cataloged and, and then put into a system where they can be borrowed, which I'm super proud of. If I look up, I've purchased, or hopefully I haven't looked in a, like a year now, but if I was to Google them or look them up on the, uh, on the catalog in Canada there, they should still be available to. So, yeah, so in library lessons, I'm going to start them with our new comic book club. So I am going to redo this kind of like, they're gonna make their own zines and there's gonna be a little section for our homemade zines. And what's cool about it is that, they can be about any topic they're passionate about. So we're gonna do'em in library lessons and they're gonna be on the shelf. I'm gonna catalog them and like other students can, uh, borrow them. They'll be stamped out and everything. It's gonna be really cool. So really excited about it actually. Yeah, it's gonna be awesome. Um, Yeah, they're easy to make. You don't need to like, you don't need to be an expert. You just literally fold paper over if you wanted to.

Lucy SB: 31:06

That sounds really cool. And that's great. I think so nice to have a library space where it's not just consuming the culture. You can contribute to it as well. It's brilliant

Lucas: 31:16

absolutely

Lucy SB: 31:17

Coming to an end now, sadly, I've really enjoyed this conversation. thank you. I'm ending all of the, episodes with a opportunity to have three thinking points or, ideas have you, have you got three takeouts that you'd like to share?

Lucas: 31:30

Yeah. Absolutely. so number one would be to, speak to your students, especially if you're in a school library or if you're in a public library. Speak to your users. So how this came about for me? was, when I first started, nine years ago, I noticed that, I didn't know really, I knew about manga cuz I worked in the public library, but, um, I didn't know what was popular here, and I didn't know what the students wanted. So I just created like a real, a clipboard with a, with a piece of paper and, on the piece of paper. And it just said, uh, tell us what kind of books you'd like us to buy. And I put it on my desk with little pencil and I left my desk to go do something. And over the course of like a lunch hour. Working and I came back at the end of the lunch hour and someone had taken like, a whiteboard marker in black and written across it in giant letters, just said, buy manga, written across it. So, and I realized then I was like, yeah, like that's something that we definitely need. But that form I used a ton and, I used kind of like electronic ways as well, like Padlet and things like that to ask. What you, we should buy. But by speaking to the students and actually asking the students, you get a sense, yes, you might get an i you might get a few, recommendations or, requests that aren't maybe age appropriate for them, but you will get an idea of what they, what they want, to read and what they're interested in. They don't have to put their names on or anything. It's simply just what do you want us to buy? What genre? It could be a genre style, whatever. I use it all the time. So speaking to your students, and maybe that sounds like pretty obvious, but it, I guess it wasn't to me at the beginning. You kind of get this idea like, librarians et cetera know better. And, and of course they know a lot, but kids also, have an idea of they want in your, and you're serving them. So in every, every library's gonna be different. I would also obviously say read, as much of it as you can yourself. Um, as I mentioned, I'm not a, I'm not a consider myself a huge Manga fan at all, but I do read, um, the first few every series that I get in just to get an idea of it. And I read comics almost every day. you don't have to be a super fan, but you should read your material. I, my experience, so I'm really lucky that students, your seven, eight, and nine are coming in. Everyday because every two weeks they have a library lesson. So we have a big school, which means like, like today for example, I had five lessons in one after another of different year groups. And I pitch books, I read from books. I, uh, talk about books constantly at the top of these lessons. And if you are pitching a book you haven't read, they see through that immediately. So I'm a hundred percent honest with'em. I say, look, I haven't read this book, but I've read the first few pages. It seems really cool, but I would rather. Read the book and be like, this book is amazing. I've read it. This is it. I won't spoil this, but this is what's, how gonna happen? Certain things, blah, blah, blah. So you have to read the books. I haven't read like a book for quote unquote adults for, for years But YA and middle grade are for adults just as much as

Lucy SB: 34:25

Oh yeah. Absolutely.

Lucas: 34:27

But as we know. Yeah and so especially if a student returns a book. and I'm like, oh, I haven't seen this one, or I forgot about this one. What's that about? And they might tell me, and I'll read through it. Especially if it's a comic, I can flick through it that night at home or whatever. But. Definitely, speak to your students and read, voraciously. And the last thing, I would say is to involve your, your staff. If you're in a school library or whatever, involve them at every stage and no matter what you do. So, as I said, every, every teacher in the school gets an invite to the, the Comic-Con, every teacher. I email different departments. The TAs, especially when we get books in, I think might appeal to, um, the students that they're, they're assisting and that they're serving. And these very often, involve comics in Manga. And I would say in a school, what I've noticed is that, and it's nobody's, it's nobody's fault or anything, it's just the nature of working in a school here in the UK is extremely stressful, extremely hectic, and everyone's in their own. They're dug in kind of world, in their departments and there's these little bubbles that you notice. But a librarian is, is in a unique position because we cover them all. So, I'm constantly talking to the staff, about different events we've got. That's why we've got, guys from the PE department coming in to, to take part in our open mic, or reading, we've got TAs and, English teachers and, science teachers coming to our, ComicCons and things like that. But it's because I'm, I'm constantly talking and briefing, sending letters home to parents, sending emails at the staff and things like that. In a kind of constant barrage of promotion about what's going on in the library. And it has made a difference. It took a while, but it's definitely made a difference to whereas they now recognize the library as a place where a, a lot of things are happening, a lot of good things, and that it's a place to be kind of like respected and that they want to get involved. So it's been really, really great.

Lucy SB: 36:23

And then I suppose once you've done all that hard work getting people on board, then they then become another voice promoting the library in their tutors and in their classes. you get that full circle.

Lucas: 36:34

Yeah.

Lucy SB: 36:35

That's brilliant. That's fantastic. Takeout. Some really powerful moments I've had as a class teacher where I've in primary, but where I've been able to say, oh, I've, I read this book and, and I, and I thought of you when I was reading it, and I think you'd really like And for that to be meaningful and that and real, not something that you're just making up, but a true, true story. Um, and they know that, that, that's true. That can be a really powerful moment for. for a child and they're sort of building their reader identity and they know that you've, you've been thinking of them when you've read something, I think definitely can really important.

Lucas: 37:06

A hundred percent.

Lucy SB: 37:07

So our final thing is, if we just tried to one a book to our to be read pile.

Lucas: 37:16

Oh gosh

Lucy SB: 37:17

recommendation would you leave?

Lucas: 37:20

I struggled, because it's so, difficult. But, I have to say it's a manga this time, and it's one that, like I said, I, I try to read, I go, oh, I'm gonna read through these manga and just get the idea of it. Um, but this one, I kind of got hooked on this manga, and it's called the Girl from the Other Side. And it's about this girl named Shiva. She's kinda like abandoned in this forest filled with creatures. Um, and she meets one of them and she thinks she's about to be like, eaten or killed, but he becomes like, a teacher, uh, to her and kind of saves her. Um, it is. erie and dark and strange, and really touching as well. But it's very weird and I just, I don't know. I just, I couldn't quite put my finger on why I liked it, but it was so odd and I just absolutely love, it's got these really dark, kind of dark covers, but I, I would give it to like 12 plus easily like year eight, students, without any issues. It's just completely, surreal and, sad. But, I kind of like that kind of thing. I like, I love horror. It's, I wouldn't call it a horror, but I, I, I love that kind of weird, stuff that kind of comes outta nowhere. It's more like a gothic, dark, gothic mystery almost. It ends up being,

Lucy SB: 38:40

selling this to me dark and odd. of my, two of my key drivers,

Lucas: 38:46

I know it's like, it's got curses, it's got all this weird stuff in it, and I I just became hooked on it. I think there's 11 in the series. It's not, it's not one of those ones where there's, hundreds at the moment. I think they're making more, that's why. I'm not sure. But, uh, I really like it and it is very popular. So, uh, the girl from the other side, I would recommend that

Lucy SB: 39:04

That sounds, great. Thank you for very much for that recommendation and thank you for joining me on the podcast today. It's been really, really useful. It's been really interesting and I loved having a chat with you, so thank you.

Lucas: 39:15

Thank you so much.