I met John Morgan Neal through various message boards and Facebook, and I found someone with a pure heart, a quick wit. While his knowledge of comics and various forms of media are great, more so, he is a person with an abiding sense of kindness. I am very happy to present here an interview about his writing journey, and the results of that journey are comics and books that should invite your purchase.
What gifts and talents does a creative artist in general need to have, and what specific gifts and talents does a writer need to have before trying to enhance them and become a writer? Do you have any role models in such? If so who are they?
John Morgan Neal: An imagination is the primary aspect any writer must have. Writing is playing make believe. What if this happened? From there you learn how to use words and sentences to convey your story and find your voice. And then you work on the discipline. because like everything else writing is work. As for role models. People like Edgar Rice Buroughs, Edgar Allan Poe, Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson, Harlan Ellison, Denny O'Neil, Stephen King, Michael Baron, Erik Burnham, Bobby Nash and some I'm sure I'm missing but most of all the last many years Chuck. He is a model writer in every aspect.
What would you say drives you to write? Do you find yourself effusive, needing expression, is it a desire to share truth, what is the reason for your being?
JMN: I'm not particularly effusive, and truth can be subjective. Any truth in my work is going to be broad or abstract or fundamental and mainly incidental. My main drive is to vent and fuel my imagination. I have a stormy brain. It builds up and my little imagination garden gets some idea rain. My interest is in cool and fun stories. I just want to pursue the kind of stuff I dig. So I do it myself. I will see a bit or type of character in something and add it to the cache to use later to expand on it or explore it more. Chuck Dixon once said of something I wrote "It's very much a comic only you could have created. A pastiche of all the things you love, but it WORKS!" I wear my interests and influences and inspirations on my sleeve. It was very gratifying that he validated it.
What authors do you pursue reading the work of, why do you think that you enjoy them, and what direct way have they helped you as a writer develop and express?
JMN: All of the writers I mentioned above. I think I learned basic story telling from Stan Lee, John Broome, Bill Finger, Gardner Fox, Denny O'Neil and such from the comics I devoured as a kid. And Charles Schultz. And Richard Matheson from the horror screenplays he did. Sadly I don't read near as much as I once did. Sleep Apnea curtailed it. I miss it.
If a person asked you, at an advanced age, how they might become a writer, if they haven't before, what would you tell them? Are writers made, or are they born? Why do you think you became a writer, and what were your first published works that showed your abilities?
JMN: Writers are born. Good writers are made. I would tell them
to read a lot of stuff, good and bad. As that is an important
distinction to learn early on. If you can't tell that is a deterrent.
Then just start writing ... and never stop.
I wanted to be like my
heroes who wrote my beloved comic books. I thought there was nothing
cooler than that. And I still do.
My first published work was in
the pages of the Shooting Star Comics Anthology. The very first Aym
Geronimo and the PostModern Pioneers stories.
JMN: How
did you come to write with Chuck Dixon, and are "Westerns" your
preferred genre to work in? What works do you have in preparation,
where can we find them, and are you on social media and interested in
interaction?
I was a fan of Chuck's starting with his
earliest works in Indy comics, particulary his Airboy comics.
Eventually he started writing my favorite DC Comics characters. Batman,
Robin Nightwing, Barbara Gordon. I became a participant on a Birds of
Prey message board and Green Arrow board that he also chimed in on. My
friend Scott McCullar who moderated those boards created the Dixonverse
message board (now Facebook page). I was a regular there and eventually
moderator. Shooting Star Comics was created from many of the regulars
and Chuck wrote a story for that as well. We became friends and he
served as a mentor of sorts. We share much in common, including loving
westerns. And one day he asked if I wanted to write a western with him. I
did and we did.
The Western genre is one of my preferred genres to
work in, as well as consume. I'd say that along with Action/Adventure, Science Fiction,
and Horror.
I just completed a story that will be apart of a project
that is still undisclosed. And I'm writing a novel in the Sidewinders
series. And I have a comic many years in the making called THEM: Atomic
Age Heroes that I'm trying to figure out how to get out there. And Aym
Geronimo is always bubbling on the back burner.
And you can find
Snakehand Sidewinders book one and Aym Geronimo Tall Tales on Amazon
and Aym Geronimo Trapdancing on IndyPlanet.
https://www.aymgeronimo.com
https://www.amazon.com/Snakehand-Chuck-Dixon/dp/9527303338/
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