![\"\"](\"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/RayNadineInterview1.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nGay League: <\/em>Hello Ray Nadine! It’s a pleasure to meet you! Thank you for taking time out of your day to do this interview! How are you?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ray Nadine: <\/strong>I\u2019m doing good! Tired, but who isn\u2019t tired these days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n GL:<\/em> When Kaitlyn Nash from Dark Horse contacted me I got excited for a couple reasons. You’re the second person I’ve encountered who is working in comics that was born and raised in central Illinois! My family moved back and forth between my parents’ home towns. One town is almost smack in the middle of the state and the other one is near the Mississippi. Was detasseling corn in the summer a teenager’s right of passage where you grew up? It was for a lot of kids during my high school years and thankfully I escaped it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n RN:<\/strong> Haha! I luckily dodged corn detasseling despite being surrounded by cornfields. I went from central Illinois to the Mississippi too! Halfway through high school my family moved to the Illinois side of St. Louis and I went to college down there too so I was there for quite some time before I came to Chicago. I do miss St Louis a lot though.<\/p>\n\n\n\n GL:<\/em> Of course the other and most important reason that excited me is your graphic novel titled Light Carries On about main characters Leon who’s in a rough spot in life and Cody who’s, well, in an even rougher spot. Would you talk some about this very unusual meet cute and the genesis of the story?<\/p>\n\n\n\n RN: <\/strong>Leon and Cody were actually characters from a completely different story that I ended up scrapping! It was a modern fantasy and the worldbuilding\u2019s scope got way too big and I had too many loose ends to figure out. At the time, I had made a pitch for a supernatural slice of life murder mystery that was more murder mystery than romance, and I really wanted to do something with Leon and Cody still, so I tweaked that pitch to suit them. I\u2019m just way better at writing character driven, small scale stories rather than big fantasy epics, so the change suited my style far more!<\/p>\n\n\n\n GL: <\/em>The way you combine elements of several genres — mystery, the supernatural, slice of life — is really appealing. The romance that you develop between Leon and Cody and their helping each other to process grief and heal is really touching. I may have taken a short break while reading but otherwise couldn’t put the book down till I’d finished. The ending’s emotional impact had me choked up and crying a little.<\/p>\n\n\n\n RN: <\/strong>So, I like to \u201cjoke\u201d that my writing goal is to make people cry as much as I made myself cry while writing it haha! From what readers have told me, I\u2019ve met my goal of that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n GL: <\/em>Discovering Chicago as the setting of your story was also a bonus surprise. It seems to me that relatively few comics use the city as a backdrop. You describe Light Carries On as your love letter to the city. That love really shines through in visual elements of the city either in panels in the story or the chapter page break photos which are clever and nicely done. A few of the mainstay fixtures you used are El trains, the Loop, Adler Planetarium, Rosehill, and newer sights like Crown Fountain and the Bean sculpture in Millenium Park. And Chicago’s punk queer scene! So many people don’t know how vibrant punk was in Chicago!<\/p>\n\n\n\n RN: <\/strong>Yeah! I just really love using real cities as backdrops, or at least if I have a story taking place in a fictional city, it\u2019ll be heavily inspired by a real place. My first comic, Dollhouse, took place in St. Louis and I often considered it a love letter to the city too. The comic I\u2019m currently working on, Station Six, takes place in a fictionalized version of the city I grew up near in central Illinois too, so it\u2019s been nice to create stories in all of the places that I\u2019ve considered home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n GL:<\/em> There’s an element of time, generationally speaking, between Leon and Cody being younger and older that’s mirrored in the ways the city does change and how technology evolves. There’s the time honored tradition of older queer people welcoming younger queers and passing down knowledge which was largely affected in many large cities due to the early years of AIDS pandemic. Are Cody and Leon acting as mentors to each other on some level or am I reading something that isn’t there?<\/p>\n\n\n\n RN: <\/strong>Oh they definitely are in a lot of ways! I hadn\u2019t considered it a queer mentoring while I was writing it, but I chalk that up to being queer myself and writing queer stories without deliberately making them queer. They\u2019re queer by default, and honestly every story I create will always be gay haha.<\/p>\n\n\n\n GL:<\/em> Before Light Carries On you worked on other projects from webcomics (your solo Dollhouse and Messenger with writer Paul Tobin) to anthologies, mini comics, and zines. Are there aspects of working in these different formats the give you different rewards and challenges? How do you keep your creativity flowing?<\/p>\n\n\n\n RN:<\/strong> Working with writers is always a challenge for me to be honest! I tend to prefer writing my own stories, but I really lucked out with the writers I\u2019ve worked with so far in my career, they\u2019ve all been a joy to work with. Paul was just so fun to work with and very open to hearing my input, and in some cases he loved how I designed some characters so much that he gave them a larger influence in the story than he originally intended. I\u2019ve been working on another story with writer Jordan Alsaqa too, our comic Raise Hell!, which has also been a really collaborative process. He\u2019s done all the writing, but we talk a lot about both of our unique experiences during the time Raise Hell! takes place and he does a good job of reflecting both of us in the story. Jordan is a good friend of mine too, so that just makes the collaborative process feel more natural. We\u2019re just two friends sharing memes and talking about our characters. Plus like, I tend to write some melodramatic and heavy stuff, and it does take a mental toll on me to an extent. That\u2019s not to say I can\u2019t write more lighthearted stuff, but Paul and Jordan are SO good at writing comedic scenes and funny moments while having a lot of heart to them. Their stories are just so much fun to draw.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With keeping creativity flowing, that\u2019s honestly something I\u2019ve really struggled with lately. I feel most creative when I\u2019m actively in the writing process, partially because it allows me more time to sit with characters and scenes, and because it allows me more energy to draw stuff that\u2019s not work related. I love drawing and it\u2019s still a hobby of mine outside of work related drawing, but when I\u2019m in the art stage of a comic it\u2019s incredibly draining and oftentimes I just don\u2019t have any creative energy at all once the work day is done. And in the timeline of making a graphic novel, I spend, like, three months writing and eighteen months drawing, so the time I feel most creative is significantly smaller. Plus with how demanding it is to upkeep social media, it can be stressful to draw stuff without feeling like it has to be able to be monetized somehow. I did end up making a separate Twitter account specifically for Final Fantasy XIV fanart, I love the game and especially love the character I made and play in the game, and my biggest fear is turning FFXIV fanart into a chore. So I have a rule that I don\u2019t make any FFXIV fanart or merch with the intention of selling it, and honestly it\u2019s been really freeing to have a quiet corner of fanart to make purely for myself and my close friends\u2019s enjoyment. And in a way, having that little bit of art for myself re-energizes me for making comics as a career. When I just straight up need a break from drawing and creating entirely, playing video games and listening to music are huge inspirations for me too. Obviously I love making and reading comics, but as far as media I love to engage with most, it\u2019s definitely video games and music lmao. I think part of it is that both of these mediums are so far out of my skill set that I get to just enjoy them for what they are. I\u2019m obsessed with making finely curated playlists, especially ones inspired by my favorite characters, my own stories, or particular vibes (currently making a two part summer playlist, Side A Summer Kick Back with upbeat pop and lofi, Side B Summer Beat Down with aggressive industrial metal and synths).<\/p>\n\n\n\n GL:<\/em> Music obviously plays a fundamental role in Light Carries On. You even created a playlist for Cody. What was on your playlists while working on the story?<\/p>\n\n\n\n So before Dark Horse picked up Light Carries On, it\u2019s working title was Dead!, named such after the song of the same name by My Chemical Romance haha. That song heavily inspired the most distilled premise of the story. Ultimately, I\u2019m so glad Dark Horse asked me to change the title cause I love \u201cLight Carries On\u201d as a title far more. That said, the current title is also inspired by a song, Saturn by Sleeping At Last, from the lyrics \u201chow light carries on endlessly, even after death.\u201d I mentioned before that I\u2019m obsessed with making curated playlists, and Light Carries On definitely had it\u2019s own apart from Cody\u2019s playlist. Some of the most influential ones on the playlist aside from the two I already mentioned are Get Out Of My Head by Firewater, I Love You Like An Alcoholic by The Taxpayers, Pictures Of You by The Cure, Upward Over The Mountain by Iron & Wine, and I\u2019ll Wait For You by Exist Strategy. Even though I have a lot of songs that inspire my stories, while I\u2019m actually writing or drawing I have a hard time listening to lyrical music at certain stages haha. I usually listen to video game soundtracks while I write and letter, my favorite to listen to is the soundtrack for Outer Wilds by Andrew Prahlow. When I\u2019m drawing and inking, I have to listen\/watch youtube video essays haha, I don\u2019t really \u201cwatch\u201d them but just having a video on my monitor keeps me from tabbing over to Twitter or other places to procrastinate on work. Most recently I watched a 2 hour series about a scientist who faked human cloning, and before that I watched a deep dive on the rise and fall of Club Penguin lmao. I\u2019ll watch just about anything, I\u2019m easily entertained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n GL:<\/em> How have you grown as a storyteller over the time you’ve been making comics? Do you have one piece of advice for someone who is either just starting out or is maybe facing a creative block or hurdle?<\/p>\n\n\n\n RN:<\/strong> Honestly, when I\u2019m in a block or hurdle, I just take a break from creating. There\u2019s some stuff you can\u2019t break from so your mileage may vary, like, even on rough days I still try to get some work done so I don\u2019t fall behind on deadlines, but if it\u2019s really not happenin, I just stop for the day. I\u2019ve tried working through burnouts before and it ends up a disaster, so taking a small break one day keeps me from having to take a long break later after a mental breakdown haha.<\/p>\n\n\n\n GL:<\/em> What is your next project and can you tease anything about it?<\/p>\n\n\n\n RN:<\/strong> Right now I\u2019m working on Station Six, published by Oni, a story about two teenage gymnasts, Riley and Kota, who befriend one another and through their friendship learn to cope with grief and anxiety, and how friendship grows and changes. Riley is deaf and Kota is hearing, which initially puts a complication in the beginning of their friendship, and the story explores how learning to communicate with each other brings them closer to one another. I was a gymnast as a teen, so it\u2019s a story that\u2019s near and dear to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m also working on Raise Hell! with Jordan Alsaqa which I mentioned earlier! It\u2019s about three teen besties in the mid-2000s in an alternate reality where the Satanic Panic was real, but the rift opening between Earth and Hell is far more mundane than it was made out to be. Imps are on par with raccoons and rodents, half-demon teens attend human high school, and the school\u2019s cliques include a coven of witches. It\u2019s a fun slice-of-life following Victor, Miri, and Reeves as they use a bootleg demon summoning kit to summon a lesser-than-life servant of Belphegor, Alistair, and the mallrat shenanigans they all get up to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Gay League: <\/em>Thank you again for your time and a great interview! And thank you for reading our interview, dear reader! We hope you enjoyed it!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Check out Ray Nadine’s site<\/a> and follow them on Twitter<\/a>!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Look for Light Carries On at your local comic shop or bookstore! Give your bookstore the ISBN 9781506726373 to order a copy! Don’t have one in your area? Try Bookshop<\/a> and IndieBound<\/a>. 3 If all else fails, you can buy a copy from Amazon<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Light Carries On by Ray Nadine is a graphic novel telling the story of Leon and Cody meeting under very unusual circumstances. I recently had the opportunity to read this sweet romantic story and was completely drawn into Ray Nadine’s message of grief, loss, and the power of love to heal. The story is also […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47,"featured_media":29352,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[91,112,298,231],"class_list":["post-29351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reviews","tag-couple","tag-dark-horse","tag-poc","tag-queer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/47"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29351"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29351\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/RayNadineInterview2.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/gayleague.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/RayNadineInterview3.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\n\n\n\n