NJW&C 21: Comic Book Confidential
Hey, Kids! It’s Nice Jewish Words & Comics!, the latest installment from Neil Kleid's bi-monthly newsletter with updates and info about his latest projects!
And here we are again, but in 2025.
Happy New Year to you, dear and faithful reader, and thanks for coming back as we dig into another solar cycle making comics, talking craft, enjoying food and pop culture, and simply enduring. It’s a bold new year which will require a bit of extra endurance from us all, and I’m thrilled that you’ve chosen to spend some of your precious time with me.
I LOVE L.A.
Before we talk about anything related to anything, I did want to use this space to say how much my heart goes out to all and any friends, colleagues, readers, fans or anyone at all affected by the horrifying events happening right now in Los Angeles related to the devastating wildfires.
This week I saw someone post a note that basically said every single person in L.A. is or knows someone who has lost a home, and though I am very much disconnected from a lot of it here in New Jersey, we’ve gone through our share of tragedies in the past, as well (9/11, superstorm Sandy, etc) and so I can imagine exactly what it feels like to have your entire life upended and destroyed in a matter of moments. For those of you suffering a loss like that, or know someone who is…I am so sorry. Even beyond lives lost, to have the things that might be irreplaceable in your lives simply obliterated—photos, heirlooms, keepsakes, one of a kind items…I simply cannot imagine. At the end of the day, most things can be replaced (even paperwork, like passports and birth certificates)…but people, pets, loved ones…I am so glad that most folks have managed to evacuate and escape. Lives can’t be replaced, and for those that have been lost, well, it’s a goddamn tragedy.
My love to all who have had to, or are still having to live through it. If you can and are willing there are several ways to donate or help out with organizations seeking help to clothe, feed, fund and rebuild the lives of victims and communities. Do what you can, where you can.
I pray for better days ahead for us all.
COMIC BOOK CONFIDENTIAL
“I wanted to write in Kitchenese, the secret language of cooks, instantly recognizable to anyone who has ever dunked french fries for a summer job or suffered under the despotic rule of a tyrannical chef…to reflect the somewhat claustrophobic worldview of the professional cook—that slightly paranoid, fiercely territorial mix of pride and resignation that allows so many of us to get up in the morning…I’m asked a lot what the best thing about cooking for a living is. And it’s this: to be part of a subculture. To be part of a historical continuum, a secret society with its own language and customs. To enjoy the instant gratification of making something good with one’s hands…easily, the happiest development to come from all of this unexpected notoriety is meeting cooks I’d never otherwise have met. That and the recognition that this thing of ours is worldwide—that the outlaw spirit survives even in the kitchens of the best of chefs; that somewhere, in the darkest part of their hearts, all cooks know how different they are from everybody else and relish their apartness.”
“I’d like them to understand what it feels like to attain the child’s dream of running one’s own pirate crew—what it feels like, looks like and smells like in the clatter and hiss of a big-city restaurant kitchen. And I’d like to convey as best I can, the strange delights of the language, patois and death’s head sense of humor found on the front lines. I’d like the civilians who read this to get a sense, at least, that this life, in spite of everything, can be fun.”
—Anthony Bourdain, Kitchen Confidential
Man, I miss that guy.
Anthony Bourdain, as you may know, started off as a professional cook and chef, and eventually blossomed into a world-renowned authority of both food and travel, spending a great many years highlighting the cuisine of third-world countries and out-of-the-way cultures, spotlighting unknown chefs making fantastic food around the globe, directing our eyes to beautiful locales with both interesting and delicious customs. Sure, Tony was a bit of a grumbly misanthrope—as he writes about himself, he was a pirate and an outlaw, having done his time in thousands of grueling kitchens, toiling at a variety of tasks, and bending elbows with cooks of all kind at midnight bars in nearly every major city—but the man had taste and an opinion about the world in which he lived, matured, thrived and became somewhat of an expert.
He also loved comic books.
Before he came a chef, Bourdain wanted to draw comics. In 2012, he finally got to make some, releasing the ridiculously entertaining Get Jiro! with DC/Vertigo, and then its sequel, Blood and Sushi, in 2015. Tony released Hungry Ghosts through Berger Books and Dark Horse Comics, and yeah, focused an episode of his show, No Reservations, on the king of everyman comics, Harvey Pekar. Just like Harvey, Anthony Bourdain was interested in real people. He wanted to listen to and learn from them, and he wanted to share their stories…and their food. And then he wanted to share them with us.
I’ve read and re-read several times Bourdain’s book, Kitchen Confidential, an expose about the restaurant business that Tony loved, and it always strikes me as a missed opportunity that he never got to write a book about working in the comic book industry.
Like a kitchen staff, a comic book creative team is also made up of “pirate outlaws”; comics creators often abandon certain trappings that society often ascribes to professional artists, and we often exist in a private little world of our own, in quiet little rooms that buck the notions of “normalcy.” Comic book creators work long, hard, sometimes unrewarding hours—often into the wee hours of the night—and as Tony wrote in his book, among us there are “strange delights of the language, patois and death’s head sense of humor found on the front lines.” Often enough, in the darkest part of our hearts, those of us toiling away on thos sequential front lines—making web or mini comics, working on graphic novels for years on end without consistent and sufficient pay—know how different we are from everybody else and, at times, like cooks, we relish our apartness.
Sometimes, I wonder if I can still consider myself part of the pirate subculture that is professional comic books ((and yeah, I know that the term “comics pirates” or “comic book piracy” is super problematic; it mostly refers to folks stealing comics by scanning them and putting them online for people to read without having to pay for them. I am instead referring to comic book creators as being outlaw artists and outside of traditional art, working in this bastard sort of media, banding together as a weird crew and collection of oddballs to pull off the impossible.) For starters, I have a steady day job. In other cases, I’m married with four kids, and consistently maintain both a mortgage and retirement fund. I don’t very much feel like a pirate when making my books. But then again, I am probably not as prolific as I could be for those very reasons—I have so many other ancillary responsibilities, that I get my comics making done on nights and the odd weekends, and maybe work on (at most) two or three books a year, which come out sporadically and inconsistently. That makes me feel less like an outlaw or pirate…and more like a dabbler or tourist. The Stede Bonnet of Comics, maybe?
If I had less of those things that slow down my output—if I went Full PirateTM, as it were—and just spent every single day working on scripts and wrangling art and handcrafting book from morning until the wee, dark houre…would I be more prolific? Would I be more of a pirate? Who knows. You make decisions in life based on the things most dear to you, and then you learn to find a balance that works best for the rest. That isn’t to say that comics are not dear to me, of course; I am most passionate about them, the medium, and the frustrating miracle that it is to bring a comic book to life. But are those things less of a priority to me these days than it was in my early years, before I had a family and a home? Perhaps they are. Hello, I’m Stede.
When I was younger, sure; in my early-to-mid-twenties, existing in New York in a small room on the Upper West Side, busting out mini comics and drawing every day…I was definitely a comics brigand, at the very least. A Sequential Buccaneer, to whom comics was the most important thing in the world and all the rest was fuel for the fire. Now, looking down the barrel of fifty this May, with responsibilities beyond my own passion for the medium…well, let’s just say that my days looting and plundering on the high seas are behind me, and I get in a little odd piracy on nights and weekends because I still need to make comics; the fire still burns, but maybe not as hot as it did in the past? I still need to be a pirate, but I’ve learned to live with pirating when the time allows. I’m good with that, honestly. But sometimes, I do miss raising the Jolly Roger on the regular, spending every single day on the dread pirate ship Comics.
Others, of course, have experienced this, as well. Some comics pirates become—I dunno—Blackbeard, and get to be full time ‘round the clock king pirates but don’t have to spend a lot of their time swabbing decks or doing the dirty work for only a small handful of loot. These are folks who have worked themselves up from being the new fish all the way to feared captains—and have been able to turn their little successes into larger ones—and lead their comics pirate crews full time, balancing that out with some of what I have, as well: family, mortgage, retirement fund.
And then…there are the comics pirates jumping from ship to ship, crew to crew, port to port, making ends meet in every adventure along the seas…never quite finding that Blackbeard level of success, but remaining pirates nonetheless. There are, of course, the independent pirates—single person / single boat operations, looting and plundering every single day, but on a less grand or well-known scale as Blackbeard. And no matter which of us you are…as a comics pirate, you’re connected to a grand legacy of comics piracy, by the bonds of a secret language instantly recognizable to anyone who has ever made their own 8-page zine or suffered under the restrictive guidelines of an unforgiving IP.
And it’s that feeling: to be part of a subculture. To be part of a historical continuum, a secret society with its own language and customs. To enjoy the instant gratification of making something good with one’s hands, or telling a tale through words and pictures, that’s ultimately what probably drew Bourdain—as it did me—toward making comics.
Like Tony, one of the happiest developments to come from any notoriety as a “pirate” in comics I ever had, is meeting comic book creators I’d never otherwise have met. And while I doubt my two-plus-decades in comics wouldn’t be sufficient to do so…I’d love if one of my fellow pirates could pull a Bourdain—could take all of this secret comics language, the good and the bad, and craft a book that allows those outside of our subculture reflect the somewhat claustrophobic worldview of the professional comic book creator. Like cooks, that slightly paranoid, fiercely territorial mix of pride and resignation that allows so many of us to get up in the morning and keep doing what we do for little pay and inconsistent recognition or gratification.
Sure; there are already plenty of books out there about making comic books. Some of them are “textbook” histories—like Sean Howe’s Marvel book, or biographies about Golden Age greats. And yeah, there was a Comic Book Confidential documentary film that interviewed a bunch of creators in 1988, and a lot of actual textbooks about how to write, how to draw, how to color or letter, and how to make comics the Marvel / DC / insert other people or company Way.
But a book about the subculture? About being a Comics Pirate? A book about spending your every waking hour breaking your hands and hearts on an unreasonable deadline? A book about marketing your first, your second, or potentially your last comic book or graphic novel to a variety of outlets through a variety of changing industry conditions…a book about selling one’s very first book at one’s very first convention? A book about pitching to small press, or scoring your first licensed project? A book about what it means to be someone in comics that isn’t a white, middle-aged cis male, and how to navigate success in that confining, restrictive environment? A book about Breaking In, and then about Staying In, and finally about Opening The Door For Others? I want to read a Bourdain-inspired Comic Book Confidential expose by someone who can really convey what it means to be a comic book pirate—running with or captaining a crew of sequential outlaws, setting sail upon this unyielding industry book by miraculous book, for years on end, because we simply need to be pirates, we have to tell these stories, and we have to do it in this specific medium or else it’s Davy Jones’ Locker for us all (in comics, is it “Rick Jones’ Locker”? That’s just another bit of “Comicese”, mateys, yet another reference to the secret language of comics.)
There are definitely folks out there who can make this book happen, who can write our industry’s Comic Book Confidential. The Anthony Bourdains of Comics (well, I mean, Tony was the Anthony Bourdain of Comics, of course, but you get my meaning.) Bendis has dabbled in some stuff like this, as has Dylan Horrocks to great effect, among others, like Faith Erin Hicks and Alex Segura. All of those folks are comics pirates through and through…but, perhaps some of them are already in their Blackbeard eras or, like me, too steady, too married, too mortgaged, too much of a Stede Bonnet to be the kind of pirate whose exploits people want to read.
The biggest shame, of course, is that Tony isn’t around to write it himself. But then, by the time he finally started making comics, well…I don’t know that his perspective would have been the right one for this book. He didn’t get a chance to clean dishes in our industry—to try his hand at every task on his way from garbage duty up to running an entire kitchen. Tony never got to write any comics characters other than his own, and his celebrity might have prevented him from getting close with the outlaws in his kitchen…the folks toiling in the back of the house, hoisting Modelos at one in the morning at some nearby bar after service is over and the place is spotless. But here’s the thing: he would have been able to write it by talking to right people, by learning what it means to be a comics pirate at any and all levels of this industry. And then he would have been able to share those stories with the world.
Dean Haspiel is possibly the perfect sort of comics pirate to write this kind of book. Or perhaps Walt Simonson, Colleen Doran, or a Steve Englehart or Kurt Busiek type. Maybe Kelly Sue DeConnick, but I’d also love comics piracy memoirs from Evan Dorkin, Todd Klein or Nate Piekos, or Shelly Bond. I’m open to all sorts of points of view. A mix of blunt memoir and a peek behind the curtain at various sausage factories, giving readers a glimpse at how the comics hot dogs are made—both the good and the bad.
I want to read this book, friends. Those of you who are well-positioned to get it done, please get on making it happen. I think it would be a fantastic read, even if—like Tony was for his fellow cooks, when he wrote Kitchen Confidential—you’re just writing it for pirates like me.
And for all you other comics pirates out there waiting for it, as well…I raise my cutlass to you in salute from my safe harbor in New Jersey, my days screaming across the seven seas on a twenty-four-hour-a-day basis long behind me. I’m still here, though no longer an outlaw. But I look forward to hearing the bloody tales of your accomplishments when you haul them—along with any ill-gotten loot—back into port.
For now? It’s 2025. I’ve got a few galleys in my sights, low and loaded in the water. I’m going to make some plans to take them with a small crew, as I can. By year’s end, hopefully I’ll have a few exploits of my own to tell.
Hoist the colors, me comics mateys. It’s a brand new year. This comics life, in spite of everything, can be fun.
WHAT I’M WRITING
As you probably know, Kings and Canvas finally hit comic book shops over the holidays and is now available to you and yours. Grab one from Outland Entertainment here if you didn’t get a chance to pre-order your copy, or if your store didn’t get one in. I sat down and re-read it this weekend and man, I am still very proud of this book from top to bottom. I’d love a chance to do tell more stories in this series, and in this world. If you bought the book and loved it—or plan to—maybe ask our pals at Outland if they’ll fund a second volume?
The big news at the end of the year was that Neil finally got his act together and built a new website to promote his books and comics! That’s right, bookmark Neil Kleid Books to stay on top of updates and links, check out reviews and my backlist of books, and direct your friends, family, enemies and frenemies to the site in order to read about and purchase my work! With social media continuing to implode and algorithms throttling the reach of indie comics creators like yours truly, it’s more important now than ever for me to have a place where fans and folks can reach me and find links to pick up my books. I appreciate you keeping a weather eye on this website, and sending anyone you think might dig my work to its various pages, to a book they may enjoy.
Other than that, it’s been heads down and working. I’m currently writing the third issue of ‘Project Mantle’, and art is slowly coming in for issue number one. Hey, it’s the New Year; here’s a quick, exclusive peek:
I’m also right at page 50 for ‘Project Taylor’, my spec screenplay, and I’m digging in now to the pitch document for something new—‘Project Danger Kings’—and I may have enticed an artist / co-author whose work I adore into joining me aboard that new adventure. More about that as it comes together. Finally, we’ve got a green light for ‘Project Sukkah’, and I’ll begin writing that starting in February. Again, heads down and working. Nothing new hitting stores or available for purchase from me until late 2025. If that changes, you’ll hear about it here first.
Tell your friends, why don’cha?
WHAT I’M EATING
A quick note to say that as I slide into my fiftieth year, I’m starting to look at getting healthier and that means changing up not only my exercise regimen, but also what I eat. Red meat and fried foods are on the no-no list…and as I grill more chicken and fish, I’m eating quite a bit of fast tacos at home. For those of you who’ve backed Pots and Panels, the comics cook book anthology in which John, Frank and I have included a brand-new Savor story, you’ll be happy to know that I’ve also included one of my taco recipes (well, it’s Savor’s, really…) and in the spirit of my bold new nutritional adventure, I’m happy to pass that recipe along to you. In the words of my people: b’tayavon ( or, bon appetit)!
Take it away, Savor:
Savor Batonnet here! I cooked and fought my way across the seven seas, and along the way I wrote down a few amazing recipes and fighting + weaponry tips so I could remember them when I got back home to Earth’s Oven (for more about that, check out my story in this book by Neil, John and Frank from Dark Horse Comics.) One of my favorite things to do with my Dad is whip up a quick batch of tacos on a Tuesday night, and carry them in a warmer or steamer basket down to the bay near our family restaurant, Taoroast, and eat them while wading around in the cool waters around our island home. Now, in my opinion, tacos are the absolute perfect street food, even if you don’t live near a street but near a beach or out in the country. They’re pretty portable, and you can mix up a variety of different fillings and toppings depending on your mood. Me, I like to make sure that I can double up ingredients and also use them for handy little projectiles and deterrents if ever attacked by hungry pirates.
Usually, the tacos at Taoroast are filled with some kind of beef or chicken…but my Dad and I have really gotten into making to fish tacos using flounder, mahi mahi, whitefish or salmon, or maybe even some seabass if it’s available and not too dear…because fish tacos are less filling and don’t slow you down in a fight (unless you fry the fish. Then…maybe don’t get into fight until they’re fully digested.) My friends Neil and John—whose daughters also like to cook with them—are big fans of good tacos, and their opinion is that whoever came up with the idea of “Taco Tuesday” is limiting themselves—tacos are an every day food! That said, here are Savor Batonnet’s Tuesday Tacos (But On a Wednesday)!
SAVOR’S TUESDAY TACOS (BUT ON A WEDNESDAY)
By Savor Batonnet
INGREDIENTS:
For the seasoning:
(You can use a store-bought seasoning, like Trader Joe’s Chili Lime Seasoning, but if you’re a taco hero like me, there’s nothing like making it from scratch!)
1/4 cup chili powder OR dried chiles
1 tsp kosher salt
1 tsp citric acid
1 tsp sugar (optional)
For the tacos:
4 (3 ounce) mahi mahi filets (you can use whatever light fish you like, but mahi mahi is my Dad’s favorite, and we serve a lot of it at Taoroast…)
1 medium tomato, diced
1/2 red onion, chopped (practice your knife skills!)
1 cup cilantro, chopped
2 scallions, thinly sliced
1 avocado, thinly sliced
Lime juice (great as a deterrent, too; I carry a spray bottle around, and go for the eyes!)
Cooking spray
8 corn tortillas
Habanero hot sauce (optional; also a great deterrent)
Low-fat sour cream (optional)
To make the seasoning:
If using dried chiles, remove the seeds (hang onto these; they’re fantastic in a slingshot) and add to a blender. Grind until it reaches a powder consistency
Transfer the chili powder to a small bowl. Add salt and acid, and mix well
Add sugar. This is optional, if the chili is too spicy for your taste
Like with all our hot or spicy powders and juices, feel free to double or triple the mixture to store some seasoning for deterrent bombs or to coat a knife.
To make the pico de gallo:
Mix the tomato, onion, cilantro, scallions and 2 tbsp of time juice together in a bowl, and then set it aside
To cook the fish:
Liberally coat the fish with your seasoning and a dash of lime juice
Either:
Preheat a conventional oven to 375 degrees. Lightly spray an oven-safe pan with the cooking spray and bake, uncovered, for 15-20 minutes, until fish flakes easily with a fork, OR
Lightly spray a non-stick skillet with the spray. Heat on medium-high, and cook the fish about 2-3 minutes per side. Reduce heat to low; cook, covered, until fish flakes easily with a fork, about 10 minutes
Once done, use a fork to lightly shred apart the fillet
If you used a skillet to heat the fish, set it aside and keep handy for any mutinous pirates who try to steal your food!
To warm the tortillas:
Place a tortilla on a preheated skillet or griddle over medium-high heat.
Cook for about 30 seconds to 1 minute on each side, until the tortilla is warm and slightly charred. You can use tongs to flip the tortillas.
After heating the tortillas, keep them warm by wrapping them in a clean towel or placing them in a tortilla warmer until you are ready to assemble your tacos.
To assemble the tacos:
Place about 1.5 ounces of seasoned fish on a tortilla
Top with pico de gallo and 2 slices of avocado
Optionally, add habanero hot sauce and/or sour cream
My best friend Coriander also likes to add a teaspoon of barbecue sauce to balance out some of the heat with a little bit of sweet. And then she calls me “her little bit of sweet heat” and I get nothing done for the rest of the day…(don’t tell her I said that!)
Yum! Enjoy!
SOME QUICK, FUN THINGS:
Check out this panel I moderated at JewCE with Amit Tishler and the Berkowitz Brothers, in which we had an exhilarating and broad ranging conversation about Jewish mythology and fantasy in adventure comics.
Yes, R2-D2 is a short king Jewish icon. I mean, he wears a kippah, for Force sake!) Last month I drew this amazing little Chanukah drawing you may have missed. Sometimes the world may seem dark and difficult, never forget that there are heroes—some of whom are closer and more real than you think—out there fighting, shining beacons of lights out there in the darkness.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f19gfOMZTtgI am loving Star Wars: Skeleton Crew, friends. We get the season finale this week, but the entire vibe of the show is like it was made for me—Star Wars and pirates space adventure with lightsaber and starships? Yes, please. It’s delightful and everything I'd ever hoped for from the show. Adventure, droids, aliens, Lil' Lobot girl, a dorky kid named Neel, strong Goonies-meets-Pirates of the Caribbean vibes, and Jedi. Also, Kelly Macdonald in Star Wars makes me live in hope for Steve Buscemi, Michael Shannon, or Michael Stuhlbarg in Star Wars (yes, I just completed a Boardwalk Empire rewatch.) Hey, Star Wars editors, I wanna write an anthology story set on Port Borgo—comics OR prose!
My man, Neel Nice Jewish Boys made Pint O' Comics' ‘Best Comics of 2024' list. "Jammed full of angst, ethical morality, and the desire to succeed." Buy the complete TPB right here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhUht6vAsMYThat James Gunn Superman trailer is exactly what we all needed right before the end of the year. Bright, emotional, and it drops you into a story we already know. Plus? Guy Gardner and Krypto. I had to draw a quick Krypto in honor of our furry lil’ hero.
Who’s a good boy, Krypto? Finally, because I’m about to do an interview this week about my novelization of the seminal Marvel Comics’ story Spider-Man: Kraven’s Last Hunt, adapted from the comics by J.M. DeMatteis and Mike Zeck, here’s a link to Marc’s blog detailing the entire story of how the original comic book storyline came to be.
Okay, that should do it for January, friends. Maybe next month we look at the step-by-step process in making a comic? Maybe something else. If there’s ever a topic you might be interested in reading about from me, you can always feel free to reply to this email.
Or, you know, I’ll wing it. Mmmm. Wings.
Stay safe out there, my friends. Get some sleep. Clowns won’t eat you.
Back soon,
Neil
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