My guests on this edition of our On the Spot interview feature are the Dabel brothers - specifically Ernst and Les Dabel - Science Fiction/Fantasy and comic book fans, turned fledgling comic studio, turned potential comic book moguls. The Dabel Brothers have combined and harnessed the powers of two separate fan boy strongholds and come up with something that has me filling out applications to be their gopher, better yet their herald - they could be Galactus and I could be Morg – so I can pay proper homage.

The Dabel Brothers publish both their original brand of comics, and adaptations of Science Fiction and Fantasy novels – tapping into existing audiences of some of the most popular authors in those genres, including George R.R. Martin, RA Salvatore, Laurell K. Hamilton, Orson Scott Card, Robert Silverberg, Raymond Feist, and Tad Williams.

Sound good?

It gets better. They recently reached a deal with industry giant Marvel Comics.

Before and without doubt beyond the recent success, it was not an uncommon occurrence to see Ernst Dabel plugging their company at various genre message boards and in a community where attitudes and faux-basement egos often times come to the forefront, I found it almost impossible to not admire the dedication they had in their projects, the humble and simply positive manner in which they carry themselves and go about business - they are literally almost impossible not to like and root for.

With that, I want to thank Ernst and Les for participating in this feature – My friends, keep on killing them with kindness:

Jay Tomio - Before The Dabel Brothers there was Roaring Studios, an imprint of Image Comics spearheaded by four brothers. What were the steps that made the production of comics an actual reality and not just a passing fancy that I think every fan of the medium ponders at least once. Was this a collaborative idea from the beginning or did one of you really knock heads to make the vision come true?

Ernst Dabel - We started out just like anyone else might in the comic book world – a small group of people with absolutely no knowledge of the workings of the industry, trying desperately to get people to take us seriously so we could publish our own books. The difference between us and most people is that we just don’t give up when we’re told “no.” And believe me, we heard it a LOT in the early days.

(Part of the reason we ultimately left our “Roaring Studios” behind to become Dabel Brothers Productions, in fact, was because people got so used to seeing us be persistent at trying to get them to work with us that they started asking, “Hey, what company do those Dabel Brothers own again?” We decided to make things easier on them by changing the name, and I think it paid off!)

The turning point for our company came when we contacted various fantasy/scifi authors in hopes of adapting their novels. George R. R. Martin was the only one who wrote us back and his answer was “no”. We were so excited and happy, because Mr. Martin had written us back and so for the next two years, we literally bombarded him with a multitude of emails filled with character concepts, colors, and all manner of other artwork on his property. We completely ignored the “no” and put in our minds that he had said “yes”. At the end of the two years Mr. Martin was so impressed with our perseverance that he offered us The Hedge Knight,” the prequel to his major series A Song of Ice and Fire. “If you can do well with this, we’ll talk about the main series,” he told us.

And what still surprises me is that we succeeded, thanks to God, Mr. Martin, our fans, and our staff. Everything we’ve done since has built upon that experience.

Jay Tomio - You made the decision that you wanted to adapt popular Science Fiction and Fantasy novels into comic book form. Was this part of the plans from the very beginning was it an idea that developed later?

Ernst Dabel - I can’t say this was our original plan per se – we always envisioned ourselves putting out original material similar to what Dreamwave was doing at the time – after all, we were huge fans of Pat Lee when we started out, and we’re still friends with him today.

But The Hedge Knight taught us something about the power of catering to established fan bases, and we learned very quickly that it’s easier and more profitable to find ways to bring fans IN to the comic book industry than to either try to appeal to the existing fans or to try to build your own. Most of us were big fans of sci-fi and fantasy, and Mr. Martin was instrumental in helping us contact some of the top authors in the industry to license their material. Sci-fi legend Robert Silverberg, in particular, is a huge supporter of our work, and we made many connections through him and his considerable influence in the publishing world.

Jay Tomio - You mention Martin’s novella The Hedge Knight. Tell me more in how you approached a fantasy adaptation, and in particular a high profile one and how was this project received by what I know is a loyal fan base, and how much of an impact did the success of this project have on acquiring other SF/F licenses?

Ernst Dabel - When we started production on The Hedge Knight, we had a very tricky problem in front of us. You see, fantasy comics weren’t really being done then, except by Crossgen, and they were, for all intents and purposes, just setting superheroes in fantasy worlds. We had seen some of the other licensed fantasy books out and we weren’t impressed because they didn’t effectively capture the spirit of the original story.

George R. R. Martin is an excellent writer with an interest in accuracy, and he expressed to us early on that he expected our work to stay true to his story. So, we asked Mr. Martin and several of his biggest fans to pick the art apart, letting us know whenever the art was not good enough or done the wrong way. We showed the pages to an even wider group of fans and begged them to be brutally honest with us. Some of them loved what we were doing; some of them nitpicked us to death. But in the end, we made our project stronger by following a simple guideline: listen to what your audience wants, and give it to them to the best of your ability.

And, based on the sales of the book and the glowing reviews it’s received, I think we made the right decisions!

Our fans (and Mr. Martin’s fans!) love The Hedge Knight – ask anyone what their favorite book we’ve produced is and, nine times out of ten that will be the book they name. I would go so far as to say I still enjoy rereading it as much as I enjoyed reading it the first time through!

Regardless, the success of The Hedge Knight opened many doors for us, and I have to say it is a thing of beauty and high quality.

Jay Tomio - Give me the Dabel Brother’s high and low moment thus far.

Les Dabel - I would say that my high point was discovering that The Hedge Knight was one of the best-selling graphic novels for 2004. I’d say my low point was in the Fall of 2005, when things were going so badly for us that we nearly closed our doors. Fortunately, things worked out in the end, and we went into 2006 much stronger for all the suffering we endured.

Ernst Dabel - I would have to agree that the latter half of 2005 was probably our toughest time, because it was the point where we had to decide if we were going to continue giving all of our profits away to publishers or if we were going to bite the bullet and self-publish from that point forward. Fortunately, after deciding to self-publish, we found a great balance between the two when Marvel Comics approached us to discuss a partnership, allowing us to remain an independent company, but helping us grow with the help of their resources and industry presence.

My high point, then, was standing up on the stage with my brother Les and shaking hands with Marvel Publisher Dan Buckley and announcing to a room of comic book retailers that we had become partners!

Jay Tomio - There was a bit of a legal snag concerning your publication of Robert Jordan’s projects and a couple of other disputes with previous publishers. Any news on the status of the Jordan project and was there a positive in this in terms of chalking up learning experiences?

Ernst Dabel - Unfortunately, I’ll have to keep the details to myself since there is still legal action pending, though I’ve learned from experience to be careful about airing my views of these sorts of situations even when there aren’t legal interests involved. Suffice it to say that we are optimistic that we’ll be able to continue working with Mr. Jordan down the road, and we apologize to all of the fans who were aggravated by the situation.

For those who want to get into comic books, let me just offer these pieces of advice:

1) Get a good lawyer to look over contracts before you sign them.
2) Always ask for references.
3) Don’t discard your principles because someone’s promising you a lot of money.

These guidelines kept us from getting ourselves into situations where we could have lost everything, and I encourage you to put them to use!

Jay Tomio As you eluded to earlier. You are now affiliated with the one of the most successful comic publisher in the world – Marvel Comics. Who approached whom and how has this relationship been going, and how different has the experience been with other publishers thus far?

Ernst Dabel - Marvel approached us in the Spring of 2006, and we spent the next six months working with Publisher Dan Buckley and VP of Sales David Gabriel to get things ironed out. Our relationship with Marvel has been tremendous, and they have done an excellent job of helping us to reorganize and start preparing for the next phase in our company’s growth. I have also appreciated that they have remained committed to allowing us to run our own company so that we can deliver the results we’re known for!
Jay Tomio With your deal with Marvel you retain your editorial autonomy. How important was that for you?

Ernst Dabel - It’s not just important, it’s essential! Part of what makes our relationship with Marvel work so well is that they trust us to do what we’ve been doing best – making top-notch comics. We know our properties, and we work very closely with our authors and our fans. That’s a large part of why we’re successful.

Jay Tomio - Does your association with Marvel impact your creative stable at all in terms of potential writers and pencilers on Dabel Brothers books?

Ernst Dabel - Absolutely! As a Marvel partner, we have a much larger presence in the industry now, which means that we have a much larger pool of potential artists to draw from. Plus, Marvel has been very helpful in tipping us off when they see a new talent who’s right for our style of book.

Jay Tomio - If you could collaborate with one comic book creator - writer or artist, who would you choose and why?

Ernst Dabel - I would collaborate with Mark Millar, because of his terrific storytelling in Civil War and Humberto Ramos because of his beautiful and unique artwork from Crimson.

Jay Tomio You currently have deals with authors like Tad Williams, Raymond Feist, RA Salvatore, Laurell K. Hamilton, Orson Scott Card and Robert Silverberg among others. What authors are on the Dabel Brothers wish list, what is your line of thinking regarding the acquisitions of licenses and do you look for in prospective additions to your stable of titles?

Ernst Dabel - Let’s just say that if I’m interested in working with an author, I talk to them immediately so that we can get the wheels in motion. One lesson I’ve learned in life is not to wait on moving forward when you have competitors nipping at your heels!

In the past, we were worried about branding, but now, we’re most concerned with market presence. We’ve actually reached a point where we have so many authors waiting to work with us that we’ve had to turn a few away because we weren’t confident that their names would attract enough attention. If we believe in a story, of course, we’ll still go for it.

Jay Tomio - With your success in tapping existing fan bases in the SF/F field, what is the status of the Dabel Brothers policy on original material?

Ernst Dabel - We’re not out of the game yet where original material is concerned… in fact, we’re still planning to republish Bill Tortolini’s Marshal (which actually sold very well) and issue a new edition of another book we released way back when called Imperial Dragons, which is based on a story me and my brothers came up with back in the early days. We’ve also got a wonderful video-game themed story from Sean J. Jordan called Minus World that is going to turn a lot of heads with its sharp writing and cool premise. We’ve worked too long on these books not to give them a shot, and we think that readers who are fans of our other properties will really enjoy them!

I would also add that we’re publishing a graphic novel called Half Dead from James Bott, Park Cooper and Barb Lien Cooper later this year. This one’s a real treasure that we rescued from the unfortunate demise of Speakeasy comics, and I’d encourage any of your readers to keep an eye out for it. The story is pretty cool – vampires and humans are fighting a secret battle in the London underground, and civilians are getting drafted into the ranks unwillingly when some unusual biological and chemical weapons are put to use. But who are the good guys? You’ll have to read the story to find out!

Finally, we have an adaptation that I’m really excited about called Prey: Origin of the Species from Michael Lent, who works with the folks at Creative Screenwriting and who also wrote a popular book on screenwriting technique and pitching. Prey is about an ancient creature that’s resurrected from deep in the ocean when a company called the Prometheus Corporation digs a little too deep, and it starts killing people immediately. A former marine biologist gets pulled out of retirement to stop the creature, and it’s important that he does, because the only alternative is to detonate a nuclear explosion that’s going to take out five miles of ocean. It’s a fun ride!

With that said, any original stories we do are going to be strictly in-house for the foreseeable future.

Jay Tomio – Sounds good! What else can we expect from the Dabel Brothers in 2007?

Ernst Dabel - Well, on the horizon, we have Kinley Macgregor’s Lords of Avalon: Sword of Darkness, which is an Arthurian romance about a dark knight who is facing off against the Knights of the Round Table. We also have R.A. Salvatore’s The Highwayman, which is based on his new series of prequels to the world of Corona – it’s a fun fusion of the Drizzt Do’Urden books and the Demon Wars series for those who are fans of Mr. Salvatore’s work, or sort of a Zorro meets The Count of Monte Cristo with a dash of martial arts for those who are just getting introduced.

We also have George R. R. Martin’s The Sworn Sword coming out soon, which is the sequel to The Hedge Knight. It’s about the continuing adventures of Ser Duncan the Tall and his squire, Egg, as they start off looking for the puppeteer girl that they saved, but wind up on a series of knightly adventures around the time of the Battle of Redgrass Field. It will be another six-part miniseries and it’s going to be fantastic!

Jay Tomio – I’m a comic book geek…err…collector. I know adaptation of Laurel K. Hamilton’s Anita Blake really was the hot book in the modern market the month and month after it was released. Admittedly the buzz on the book surprised me – was this a surprise hit that you guys felt on the publishing level?

Ernst Dabel - We knew from the moment we started production that the Anita Blake books were going to cause a stir, and we made sure we supported the book with an excellent marketing plan and a lot of pre-release buzz to make sure that it got the attention on the racks that it deserved. What we love is that retailers have been calling and emailing us with stories about how this book has been bringing new fans into their stores – especially women, which is far from the normal demographic most stores cater to! Laurell K. Hamilton has millions of devoted fans around the world, so we are thankful that they’re supporting the book. But we’ve been hearing back from many comic book fans as well, praising what we’re doing!

Jay Tomio I frequent quite a few Science Fiction and Fantasy sites a community that I’m proud puts up with me and close to my heart, and everywhere I go I see you guys enthusiastically pushing your product. How valuable (or not) has the online SF/F community been regarding either feedback or spreading the word of the Dabel Brothers?

Ernst Dabel - Since we began as an independent studio, we’ve always been aware of the power of the Internet to help a niche publisher push a product in a big way. Ten years ago, what we’re doing now was barely possible; twenty years ago, we would have relied solely on word of mouth to help us achieve anything. With the Internet at our disposal, we’re able to keep in touch with our fans in a very real way, and we’ve worked hard to stay in touch with fans of sci-fi/fantasy so that we don’t have to wonder where to go next.

Jay Tomio - What about the fan in you? Who are your favorite SF/F authors and what comics do you dig?

Ernst Dabel - J.R.R. Tolkien will always be my favorite because it was a copy of “The Hobbit” that my brother Les gave to me as a Christmas gift when I was in the sixth grade that made me fall in love with fantasy/scifi. I’m also a big fan of many, many other authors and my dream is to someday have a huge library of adaptations that fantasy/scifi fans can really enjoy.

My favorite comics are Crimson, the comics we publish and Civil War!

Jay Tomio - Four sons in one business. How much of an impact did your parents have in the formative years of the Dabel Brothers?

Ernst Dabel - Family has ALWAYS been an important reason behind our success, and I cannot overemphasize how much my parents have done to keep us in this game, even when we’ve wanted to back out. Our family is extremely close-knit, and we still get together each night for family prayer so we can share our concerns and our success stories with each other and with God.

Bill (Art Director) and Sean (Communications Director), who have been with us for five years now, like to joke that me and Les are almost the same person, because we always seem to agree on everything. It’s true, though – as brothers and as family, we’ve learned to work together and share in our successes and our troubles, and it’s been a driving force behind the way we run our company.

The Dabel Herald - On behalf of Fantasybookspot.com, I want to thank Ernst and Les for the time and wish them the best of luck in 2007 and beyond. You can check out the Dabel Brothers at Dabelbrothers.com. If you are an SF/F author looking to see your product in the hands of comic book readers – these are the cats you need to get at.

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