ShareThisEven as a preschooler, Jimmy Gownley loved to draw and write.
His parents encouraged him, and also read aloud to him from all kinds of books, including comic books like "Batman," "Superman," and paperback collections of "Peanuts" comic strips. Gownley's mother would ask him to make up stories to go with vocabulary words she wrote on index cards.
"I don't remember a time when I didn't draw, and I really don't remember a time when I didn't read," Gownley said in a recent telephone interview from his Pennsylvania home.
Given his upbringing, Gownley says, creating comics "is hard-wired into my brain." So, it's not surprising that Gownley now is the author and illustrator of a popular, award winning comics series for kids called "Amelia Rules!" So far, four volumes have been published; the latest is titled "When the Past Is a Present" (Renaissance Press, $11.99).
With support from his parents, Gownley self-published his first comic, "Shades of Gray," at age 15, selling it out of his high school locker and at local convenience stores in his hometown of Girardville, Pa.
After graduating from Millersville University, Gownley began marketing the comic on a more national scale, winning fans among adults who regularly frequent comic book stores. But he never thought he could make a living as a comics creator, and worked for years as a graphic artist to pay the bills.
One day, as he was working on "Shades of Gray," Gownley flipped over the page and drew a little girl. From that first doodle, Gownley created a new series starring 9-year-old Amelia Louise McBride, who is forced to move from Manhattan to small-town Pennsylvania after her parents divorce.
Despite the challenges Amelia faces, she never loses her sense of humor as she gets into scrapes and has adventures with her friends, the superhero-loving Reggie, the intensely competitive Rhonda, and Pajamaman, whose thoughts can be found on the ever-changing patterns of his sleepwear. Amelia also gets lots of support from her cool, rock star aunt, Tanner Clark, in whose house she and her mother now live.
In creating "Amelia Rules!," Gownley said, "I was thinking that comics had really forgotten kids. I thought it would be nice if this wonderful art could be for kids too. But I looked around and found there wasn't much being done for kids."
Gownley's surmise was correct. While comics and kids were synonymous in the 1950's and 1960's, by the 1990's the comics market was geared towards adults -- mostly adult males -- who had the money to buy expensive, lavishly-illustrated books like Frank Miller's "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns."
In the past few years, however, publishers have begun to realize that there is a potential goldmine in offering comics that are more geared to kids. For example, the booming popularity of manga -- Japanese comics translated into English - among teens and tweens has shown there is a market for such books.
Random House has found success in publishing the "Babymouse" series for kids. Last year, the "TOON" series of comics for kids beginning to read was launched by "New Yorker" art director Francoise Mouly and her husband, Art Spiegelman, whose Pulitzer Prize-winning book "Maus: A Survivor's Tale" helped establish the new market for literary graphic novels for adults over the past decade.
With his "Amelia Rules!" series, Gownley is one of the pioneers opening comics back up to kids. Gownley began publishing the series in 2001, finding increasing success with each issue. Then, last October, Simon & Schuster purchased the rights for the series from Gownley, taking "Amelia Rules!" to a new level of national marketing.
Simon & Schuster will be reissuing the series, beginning with volume 1, "The Whole World's Crazy" in May.
Gownley's good fortune in connecting with Simon & Schuster has bolstered his desire to help parents and teachers realize how comics can help get -- and keep -- kids reading. Several years ago, Gownley, who is married and has twin daughters, established an organization called "Kids Love Comics" (www.kidslovecomics.com) to further that effort.
Gownley has just hired a new director for the group because he needs to focus his time on creating the latest book in the "Amelia Rules!" series, "The Tweenage Guide To Not Being Unpopular."
As the series continues, Amelia and her friends will continue to grow, change and age, Gownley said.
"I definitely want Amelia to grow up," he said. "I do have an end in mind, but I'm nowhere near that yet. I can see at least eight books in the series."
Meanwhile, Gownley is thrilled to finally be a full-time comics creator.
"I wake up each morning and actually go down and draw comic books for a living," he said.
(Karen MacPherson, the children's/teen librarian at the Takoma Park, Md., Library, can be reached at Kam.Macpherson(at)gmail.com. For more stories visit scrippsnews.com)
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