Richmond’s comics scene is mighty.

We’ve got comic book stores like Velocity Comics on Broad, which has been around for over 20 years, the Graphics Narrative Lab at Virginia Commonwealth University, a research center dedicated to sequential arts (a more encompassing way to say comics), and homegrown comics gatherings like Bubbles Con, and the comics fanzine it’s named after.

Like all vibrant scenes, it exists because of the many talented, hardworking, community-minded people who create, read, love and let’s just say it, live and breathe comics. Dr. Francesca Lyn is one of these tireless champions. She’s co-director of the Graphics Narrative Lab; a comics scholar and assistant professor at VCU; co-founder with Christine Skelly of Comic Arts Richmond, an independent small press fair; on the executive committee of the Small Press Expo (SPX), a national comics conference; and recently celebrated the release of a comic book she edited, “Everything Is Fine, I’ll Just Work Harder” by Cara Gormally. On top of all this, she’s a comedian — I saw her perform at The Roost at Benchtop earlier this year.

Recently, we got coffee at Lamplighter and I asked her about editing comics, the new historical comic she’s writing about the Underground Railroad and the comics and stand-up comedy scenes in Richmond [the interview has been edited for space and clarity].

Style: Tell me about this new book.

Francesca Lyn: ”Everything is Fine, I’ll Just Work Harder” is published by Street Noise based in New York. Liz Francis is the publisher and she’s amazing. Honestly, I could say that I work with her, but I also consider her one of my mentors. The kinds of books that she finds to publish are exactly the kinds of books that I would want to publish, too. I’m working on another book [for them] now that’s a memoir of a cartoonist’s fertility journey. I’m super jazzed about that because it’s not something that I have ever heard anyone talk about in this context before. [“Everything is Fine”] was amazing. The author is also an academic, so it was cool to be able to speak the same language.

[You] recently finished writing the script for a historical comic about the Underground Railroad in the “History Comics” series. I want to know how one writes a historical comic book: Does the writer write like a playwright and narrate what goes on in every panel? Or just write the dialog? Do they get a say in how the drawings look?

For this one, I wrote it as a very straightforward comic script with what’s on every panel, what’s in every caption. And even though people are going to be checking for historical accuracy, I included a lot of historical background. I even [did research] about what colors were historically accurate, what [people] might be in the background [of the panels]. So, the artist [Maya Henderson] doesn’t have to stop and be like, ‘Oh, I wonder what color this should be.’ I pulled a lot of references and inspiration from first-person narratives, particularly from things that were collected by a man named William Still. He recorded the people that came to his house who were formerly enslaved, people escaping. He basically interviewed them. He would ask them, “How did you escape? What happened?” And a lot of the things that I had thought and assumed, even though I knew a significant amount about the Underground Railroad, were not accurate to the lived experiences of these people.

What were some of the assumptions?

The idea that there is someone like the conductor or someone leading all these people away. There’s many, many, many stories of people who were self-emancipated and who …just had a vague idea of where to go. A lot of people doing this on their own, disappearing into the night and walking, unsure if they were going the right way. I had to think about how to visualize that. It’s a great project to work on, and I’m so excited that it’s going to be a book for younger people to read, not just adults, but it’s not sugarcoated in any sort of way.

You got interested in comics while still living in your home state of Florida before coming to VCU for your PhD. What inspired you to focus on comics in your scholarship?

I came into my PhD program knowing I wanted to study media. I was really interested in hybrid music, mashups, and all sorts of things like that. But I didn’t think I really wanted that to be my focus of study. I am someone who read comics as a kid like many people do, but was not a super avid comic book collector or that kind of fan. I took adult cartooning and comics classes at the Sequential Artists Workshop and through them I met two huge inspirations to me, Tom Hart and Leela Corman, who are both cartoonists and their work is incredible. I had a fine art background before that, but I had never really made comics. And the comics I made aren’t the best comics in the whole world, but there was a lot of joy in them.

[Lyn brought some show-and-tell to our meeting—“Everything is Fine” and “Ruined,” a steamy, Regency romance graphic novel she edited published by 23rd St.— but none of the comics she’s drawn].

I make artwork, but I make artwork more for fun. I have a BFA in fine arts in painting. But what I have found is that when I’m working on one creative thing, it’s kind of harder to do other creative things at the same time. I’ve been refocusing on writing and editing, and it has been a joy to rediscover painting at the same time, but on a much smaller scale.

Do you count stand-up as a creative endeavor?

It’s definitely a creative endeavor, and I think that stand-up’s great for expanding your worldview. Thinking about the way in which you channel emotion and [develop] a narrative voice is something I think about a lot through all [my] projects. I think the best standup is so very clearly your own voice, and it’s impacted by who you are and what your identity is. I think the strongest standups really have a singular idea of their identity. Did you see Marc Maron’s most recent special? He’s always been one of my favorites, but the way that he has very skillfully made a special that is hilarious but also is, at points, incredibly touching and pointed towards what is happening today. And he’s always kind of been a person who doesn’t suffer fools; and I thought, oh what a needed voice right now. It’s great.

Who else do you love in the comedy world?

The first person that made me want to do standup is probably Margaret Cho back in the day. I remember her very first special and being like, Oh, there’s someone I’ve never seen before, and someone I relate to also, being the child of immigrants. I’m also inspired by people from the local scene here that I think are so funny. One of the people that I really connected with early on, who still does stand up, and she’s a boss, and she’s killing it, and she has done stuff in D.C. and all over New York is Patrice DeVeaux. I love her. She’s amazing.

[We talk about how both the comedy and comics scenes in Richmond feel like more than just a ‘scene,’ they feel closer and more supportive]. I’m a poet and our community exists partially because we host readings in our living rooms and sleep on each other’s couches.

I think it’s the same kind of thing. It feels very much like we are just taking the same $20 and passing it from one person to the other. The first time I went to SPX [Small Press Expo], I’m pretty sure I drove up and slept on the floor of someone’s hotel room. I slept with an afghan that I brought in my car. That always sticks out as a significant thing.

[Especially now, since Lyn helps run SPX, the national annual comics art conference held in Philadelphia. This past year, she was the Ignatz Awards Ceremony Coordinator, organizing the presentation of the prestigious Ignatz Awards given out to the best comics and graphic novels published in the previous year.] Of that role, she says:

Now [I’m in a position] to help other people. If I can ever introduce someone to someone else, if I can help someone with a resource, if I can help them even by sharing something on Instagram, which is a very small thing, I want to do it because it’s just given me back so much more than I ever could have thought.

What are you working on next?

I’m writing a novel right now. And it is intimidating, but it’s also something that I was like, if not now, when? And this will be my second academic year co-directing the Graphic Narratives Lab with [professors] Bernard Means and Grace Gibson. We’re planning a series of events called Comics, Coffee, and Conversation, and we hope to incorporate talks and workshops within it. And I’m always looking for more opportunities to write and edit comics, especially memoir and horror comics.

On Thursday, Nov. 20,  Comics Arts Richmond is hosting an animation night with local animators Juan Pablo Patino and Maggie Gercken. The free event will include comics vendors and a comic and zine swap. Donations suggested for CAR. They will also be selling some merch and comics.