![\"\"](\"https:\/\/karaashleydeyold.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/Gasaway.jpg\" "\\"Gasaway\\"")
<\/a> MIKE GASAWAY — DIRECTOR AND AUTHOR<\/strong><\/p>\nKARA:<\/strong> Hi Mike. It’s a real treat to have you here today.\u00a0Tell me about this adorable book, “Little Mikey the Vampire Monkey.” What lessons do you hope children learn from reading this story?<\/p>\n MIKE:<\/strong> That if there is something that you are or possess that is not the same as others you are special, not different. \u00a0Little Mikey embraces the fact that he\u2019s not like the other kids and makes the most of his abilities.<\/p>\n \n KARA:<\/strong> What discussions have you had with your own children, about Mikey?<\/p>\n MIKE:<\/strong> They helped a ton with the story. \u00a0We always talk about fun stories and fun characters. \u00a0We all thought it would be great to have a monkey that was a vampire. \u00a0Since I wrote a chapter book series too, they\u2019ve been great little critics.<\/p>\n KARA:<\/strong> You highly regard and listen to your kid’s opinions on your work and appreciate their feedback. What were some insights they’ve had that really surprised you?<\/p>\n MIKE: <\/strong> They\u2019re pretty sophisticated. \u00a0I think that a mistake that writers may make is writing \u201cdown\u201d to kids. \u00a0They\u2019re a lot smarter than we think sometimes. \u00a0My oldest thought I was writing too young at first. \u00a0I changed some of the style and made it more like the way I like to write and it meshed perfectly.<\/p>\n It\u2019s good to know that my sense of humor is right up the 10-14 year old alley too. \u00a0It was great hearing my daughter read the book and laugh out loud. \u00a0That was very gratifying.<\/p>\n KARA:<\/strong> What were some of the fun moments that happened while creating this story? The artwork process? Working with Jason?<\/p>\n MIKE:<\/strong> The fun part and the hard part was trying to make the lines of the story work on the pages. \u00a0I had to rework it so many times just so it flowed nicely. \u00a0That was a little weird to write that way.<\/p>\n Having Jason send me artwork was very fun. \u00a0It was like Christmas every time I got his artwork. \u00a0I had very little notes on the process as well. \u00a0Jason was simply great. \u00a0He can do so many styles. \u00a0This is one that he wanted to try and it worked great.<\/p>\n KARA:<\/strong> What was the most challenging?<\/p>\n MIKE:<\/strong> I thought it would be difficult not being in the same place but since he was in Dallas and I was in Ohio, it worked out fine. \u00a0We used dropbox and sometimes were even working on the same files. \u00a0I would get his art, add the text and then he would do those little sketches on top of that. \u00a0It was a very neat process.<\/p>\n KARA:<\/strong> A question for my writing and artistic readers who are thinking about self-publishing; what did you think of working with CreateSpace? Any advice?<\/p>\n MIKE:<\/strong> CreateSpace was and is fantastic. \u00a0I tried a few of the others but CreateSpace was by far the easiest. \u00a0I haven\u2019t used their marketing but for production it\u2019s a no-brainer. \u00a0It was a little hard to get the cover right but that was only because I didn\u2019t understand all the terminology. \u00a0Bleed is a completely different word to me since I like horror movies, so that was something I had to learn.<\/p>\n Definitely take your time when putting the book together. \u00a0I made sure not to rush anything and looked at the proof very carefully.<\/p>\n KARA: <\/strong>Now, I heard there is another version of Mikey for older readers? A series?\u00a0How are those coming along?<\/p>\n MIKE:<\/strong> The series was completely done on accident\u2026sort of. \u00a0My agent at the time, thought that an illustrated book would be very hard to sell. \u00a0So as an option, I started writing a chapter book. \u00a0After a few days, it just took on a life of its own. \u00a0I couldn\u2019t stop writing.<\/p>\n I wrote one long manuscript that I had my 12 year-old read and she said that it moved slowly. \u00a0I wasn\u2019t sure if I wanted it for her age group so I looked up how to write for 10 year olds on google. \u00a0I found a site that said to write shorter chapters and try to leave them on a cliffhanger. \u00a0I made the changes to the manuscript and found that I had to break up the story into smaller stories \u2013 about 70-100 pages each. \u00a0The first book went to a proof and I let my 10 year-old read it and she couldn\u2019t put it down. \u00a0She was even mad at me because I left the first book as a cliffhanger as well. \u00a0She wanted to read the second book immediately!<\/p>\n So the series consists of three books that follow Mikey as opposed to Little Mikey. \u00a0It\u2019s a similar story but told in an older way than the illustrated book. \u00a0I tried something different with this book too. \u00a0I wanted to do an animated series where the main character would interrupt the show like a Malcolm in the Middle. \u00a0So I have Mikey interrupt the author in the book. \u00a0He may get into an argument about how the events in the story went down. \u00a0It gives a nice different feel to the book and adds a lot of comedy. \u00a0I even have his body parts join in on the fun!<\/p>\n \n KARA: <\/strong> Funny! I really enjoy reading your blog. Why did you decide to document the process of making a movie through a daily journal?<\/p>\n MIKE: <\/strong>When I was in LA pitching my stuff to various producers, I kept hearing over and over, \u201cHow big is your current audience?\u201d \u00a0I thought that was odd since I had NO audience. \u00a0There was a silly more adult series that I was working on that I posted on the internet and it was getting some hits. \u00a0A producer told me to come back to him when I had a couple thousand hits. \u00a0Honestly, I thought that way of thinking was insane.<\/p>\n But then I thought. \u00a0Look at the popular movies that were coming out. \u00a0Most were already popular books. \u00a0They HAD a following and a built-in audience. \u00a0So I thought the best way to do it was through the social media outlets. \u00a0I knew that people love to hear the behind the scenes stuff about movie and television making. I have a lot of stories from working on three television shows and one movie, so I wanted to get that out there.<\/p>\n I also wanted people to hear about the movie from day 1. \u00a0They would hear about how I come up with an idea, how I write the story and script and then what happens in production like storyboards and animation and so on. \u00a0So far, the response has been very positive. \u00a0My follower base is growing every day as well.<\/p>\n The story that I\u2019m crafting is another 3 book series. It\u2019s an idea that I\u2019ve been swirling around quite a bit and am very excited about. \u00a0It\u2019s about an orphaned 12 year-old boy who finds a pair of glasses that allow him to see into an alternative world, parallel to ours. \u00a0He also finds out that he is needed in this world to stop an evil man from stealing the childhoods from children. \u00a0There\u2019s a lot of adventure because this boy has to find ingredients for a recipe to create a machine to fight the bad guy. \u00a0I\u2019m currently finishing the first pass and about ready to do the first rewrite. \u00a0It\u2019s been an adventure since the characters are talking to me now. \u00a0That\u2019s pretty cool and creepy at the same time.<\/p>\n What I hope to have happen is the book will be completed and then people will buy that book. \u00a0If it all goes to plan, the book will be pretty decent and people will talk about it. \u00a0Thus, the built-in audience is created. \u00a0It\u2019s very grass roots, I know but I think through time, it will work.<\/p>\n You can check out what day I\u2019m on by going to www.gasmangroup.com\/blog KARA:<\/strong> Where can young readers find your books? Anything new and exciting coming up, that you can share with us?<\/p>\n MIKE: \u00a0There are a couple places. \u00a0The easiest is the Mikey site: \u00a0www.mikeythevampiremonkey.com<\/p>\n There\u2019s a tab that has the books on it that will direct you to the CreateSpace site. Check out some of the other projects on my home page at www.gasmangroup.com<\/p>\n KARA:<\/strong> Excellent! Thanks for stopping by!<\/p>\n PART B: IT’S ALL ABOUT COLLABORATION: JASON DORF INTERVIEW<\/a><\/p>\n \n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" PART A: IT’S ALL ABOUT COLLABORATION! Mike Gasaway’s stories are never short on laughs and maybe that’s because he’s had a lot of practice, with successful results. Mike was a director for several years on the Jimmy Neutron tv series and Barnyard, and has done his fair share of screenwriting, producing and pitching. He provided … Continue reading “Artist — Mike Gasaway”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":53,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-329","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/karaashleydeyold.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/329","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/karaashleydeyold.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/karaashleydeyold.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/karaashleydeyold.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/karaashleydeyold.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=329"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/karaashleydeyold.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/329\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1052,"href":"https:\/\/karaashleydeyold.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/329\/revisions\/1052"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/karaashleydeyold.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/53"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/karaashleydeyold.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=329"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a><\/a>
\nWhile there, make sure you like it too! \u00a0The more the merrier!<\/p>\n
\nI am currently talking to a few people about creating a small company but it\u2019s in the very early stages. \u00a0It\u2019s very exciting but most of my time is focusing on my new series.<\/p>\n