The following is an interview with Lonnie Mann regarding the release of his graphic memoir, Gaytheist: Coming Out of My Orthodox Childhood. In this interview, Fanbase Press Editor-in-Chief Barbra Dillon chats with Mann about his creative process in sharing his journey with readers, what he hopes that readers may take away from his story, and more!
Barbra Dillon, Fanbase Press Editor-in-Chief: Congratulations on the release of Gaytheist! What can you tell us about your decision to share your story with readers?
Lonnie Mann: Thank you! One reason I was interested in sharing my story is that I haven’t really seen other stories about the unique intersection of being Orthodox Jewish and queer. There have been various (very good!) memoirs, documentaries, and even reality TV shows, about people who grew up Orthodox, and then left the community at some point in adulthood.
While growing up, I had access to TV, movies, and the internet, so I had some level of insight into how “normal” Americans lived, though it was filtered through the lens of those mediums. Obviously, kids and families in shows on Nickelodeon didn’t represent actual kids and families entirely realistically, but it was enough for me to know that the world I was growing up in was very different and strange, comparatively, from the average American experience (whatever that might be).
Although I was geographically right nearby non-Orthodox families who went to public schools, we lived worlds apart, and I’ve wanted to show those differences to people for a very long time. I think it’s interesting to see how different kinds of people live differently from yourself, and it can be especially surprising when they’re right nearby. It often makes people think they have a roughly accurate idea of what different cultures and lifestyles are like, but I’ve found that people are consistently quite surprised when they learn more about what it’s actually like to live with the daily rules and restrictions of Orthodox Judaism.
BD: What can you tell us about your shared creative process in working with your spouse (artist Ryan Gatts) to bring this personal narrative to life on the page?
LM: While I was working on the art for the version of the script that eventually became the finished book, Ryan (who is a much better technical artist than I am—they’re great at stuff like perspective, backgrounds, etc.) offered to try collaborating on the art, to potentially help speed up the overall process, and lighten my workload.
We did a test with the very first page of the prologue, and it came out great! Basically, I gave them the initial (very rough) sketch, and they created very nice cleaned up “pencils,” which I used as guidelines to “ink” over, and adjust certain aspects. (We worked completely digitally, so I’m using terms like pencils and inks more to refer to the steps in the process than actual materials.) Then, I colored the page, and finally Ryan adjusted and enhanced my colors as a final step. They’re also great at lighting, as they’re a professional VFX Artist for video games.
I loved how that page came out, so we continued this experiment for the rest of the prologue. That went great, too, so we decided to just keep going with that process for the rest of the book: I’d give Ryan a very rough sketch with all the panels and text already laid out, they’d do a nice, tied-down sketch, which I’d ink over and color, and, sometimes, they’d do a second color pass for scenes with more complex lighting.
But, it was actually a pretty long process (It took many years.) to bring this book from conception to publication, and I didn’t switch from drawing it on my own to drawing it with Ryan for a long while. I did kind of always know I wanted to tell a story about my experiences growing up, in some format, and I created the very first version of this comic as a sort of 10-page prototype, while in a class at the School of Visual Arts in New York. (I quit my job as a web designer to go back to school for about a year and a half, to study illustration and cartooning, before I had to quit school to go back making enough money for rent.)
A few years after that, I started working on a script for a proper full-length graphic novel. Once I finished the first draft of the script, I created page layouts and very rough sketches for the whole thing, and then finally created a 15-page sample of “finished” artwork—that’s to say, what this set of comic pages would look like in the finished book, to give a better idea of the project overall—which I used to pitch agents. I managed to get one, and we pitched to about 20 publishers, but we didn’t get any offers.
After that, I spent about 3 years rewriting the script. But unfortunately, when I felt like I was ready to start pitching again, my former agent no longer had bandwidth for the project, and I had to start over again. My drawing collaboration experiment with Ryan occurred at this point, while I was pitching new agents, as well as publishers directly, on my own. Eventually, through a string of good luck and referrals from one person to another, I was connected with Liz at Street Noise Books, who decided to publish Gaytheist.
BD: At Fanbase Press, our #StoriesMatter initiative endeavors to highlight the impact that stories can have on audiences of various mediums. How do you feel that your story may impact readers, and are there any conversations or questions that you hope that it might inspire?
LM: Like others who’ve made memoirs about leaving Orthodox Judaism, one thing I hope to shed light on is how intense and cultish the religious sect is. I feel like when the topic of fanatical religious sects and cults come up, Judaism is not usually mentioned. It seems to me like people have a general impression that of the big 3 umbrellas of sects—that is, within Christianity, Islam, and Judaism—Judaism is usually seen as perhaps the most reasonable, or without any dangerous aspects even within its most devout sects, or even that it’s generally the most progressive. I think one reason for that might be that since Judaism doesn’t proselytize to non-Jews (only to get less religious Jews to become more observant), so perhaps its seen as generally less threatening, as far as extreme religious groups go?
And to be fair, the majority of Jews and Jewish sects (e.g., Reform and Conservative Judaism) are much more reasonable than Modern Orthodox, let alone Ultra Orthodox Judaism. There are also plenty of people who consider themselves “culturally Jewish,” that is to say, they don’t necessarily believe in God or practice any religious rules or rituals, but do continue and celebrate purely cultural aspects of being Jewish, like food, holidays, humor, cultural priorities, and so on.
But when it comes to Orthodox Judaism at least, I want people to be aware of how restrictive and suffocating it can be to grow up, and in some cases remain trapped, in an Orthodox Jewish family/community, especially if you’re queer. I fortunately managed to escape, but many people spend their whole lives trapped, due to the prospect of losing their friends, family, custody of children, as well as professional networks and job opportunities, if they ever stop practicing. It can easily be way too much of a risk to even consider for many people.
Outside of all that, the book is also definitely intended for queer and straight folks alike, who are stuck in (or who also escaped) other high-demand religions. I’ve received comments from various people who said they were able to identify with many parts of my story, even though the specific details weren’t identical, because the overall feeling of the experiences aligned. I’ve loved hearing their stories as well.
BD: What do you feel made Street Noise Books the perfect home for Gaytheist?
LM: Street Noise Books is really an incredible publisher that lifts up so many different minority voices and gives them a home. Not only queer voices, but people sharing their experiences with all sorts of discrimination, disabilities, struggles with mental health, becoming refugees, and more, not to mention how much intersectionality you’ll find across their catalog.
When Liz at Street Noise Books offered to publish Gaytheist, she wasn’t trying to fit it into a pre-determined idea of what this book was supposed to look like, and instead embraced the story I was telling. Not that we didn’t revise and edit it, of course, but it still remained the same story. When I was pitching other potential publishers, many had precise restrictions on, for example, what makes a book either a middle-grade graphic novel, or an adult graphic novel, and my book doesn’t perfectly fit into those cookie-cutter templates. So, I feel really fortunate to be published by Street Noise.
BD: Are there any other projects – past or current – that you would like to highlight for our readers?
LM: If you’re curious for other memoirs by ex-Orthodox Jews, I recommend Foreskin’s Lament by Shalom Auslander, which is mostly comedic, but there are some serious/heavy parts, as well. I also recommend All Who Go Do Not Return by Shulem Deen.
Unorthodox on Netflix is a good show, which is a dramatization of the memoir by Deborah Feldman, Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots.
For documentaries, One of Us (2017) is about three ex-Hasidic Jews, and Trembling Before G-d (2001) is about various queer Jews at different levels of faith, struggling with reconciling their beliefs and sexuality. It’s much more of a time capsule, being almost a quarter-century old, and it can be hard to find, but I think it’s an interesting insight into the time period when I was in high school, which is when much of my book takes place.
And last but certainly not least, some of my favorite comics:
- Queer graphic memoir: Fun Home by Alison Bechdel (but I also loved the follow-up Are You My Mother?, maybe even more than Fun Home!
- Non-queer graphic memoir: Stitches: A Memoir by David Small
- Most unique comic: Here by Richard McGuire
- Recently read: Flamer by Mike Curato
- Queer comic series: Heartstopper by Alice Oseman
- Serious queer manga: Wandering Son
- Light ‘n fun queer manga: Go For It, Nakamura!! by Syundei
BD: Lastly, what is the best way for our readers to find out more about Gaytheist and your other work?
LM: You can learn more about Gaytheist, and read a couple free sample chapters, at www.lonniecomics.com. There are links there to various sites where it’s for sale, but you can also ask for it at your local bookstore or comic shop, or request it at the library!
As for other projects, in 2015 I Kickstarted the printing of a travelogue comic about a couple trips I took to Iceland. It’s called Thoughts From Iceland, and you can still find it if you look for it!
One other thing to mention about Gaytheist is that this book is actually only a little more than half the full script I pitched, which ended up being far too long for a single book. I did a bunch of work to revise the final chapter into more of a book ending than just another chapter ending, and I do feel this book stands on its own. That said, I still want to hopefully (one day) have a follow-up book to more fully complete this story. So, fingers crossed for that!
