Humor
Date Published: May 23, 2024
Publisher: BookBaby
"Peculiar People and the Pets Who Love Them"…lovingly written and illustrated by Justin Moroyan, is a darkly-whimsical and addictively-humorous picture book that tells the stories of fantastically weird people and their equally strange and adoring pets
These stories revolve around characters who are gloriously abnormal. They embrace that attribute, and don't shy away from being their unique, spectacular selves. Like Madam Rosette and her poodle, Josette, who only enjoy "bad" smells…or Samurai Megasaki, who is addicted to water but also allergic to it. Each spread welcomes you into wondrous, stunningly detailed, vibrant illustrations, and stories that are guaranteed to capture your imagination and tickle your grey matter. Each time you explore it, you'll discover new secrets and symbolism that delve you deeper into captivating worlds you will inexorably fall in love with.
Introduce yourself and tell me about what you do.
I'm an illustrator and writer, and I've always loved expressing myself on paper...the ability to work within a space where I can make anything happen has always been a form of therapy for me. It's one of the reasons I love the Fantasy and Sci-Fi genres so much.
"That's the wonderful thing about crayons. They can take you to more places than a starship." (Guinan, Star Trek: The Next Generation)
I share an affinity for dark humor with some of my atypical real-life superheroes, like Tim Burton, Charles Addams, Edward Gorey, and Wes Anderson. Of course, I can't leave out the wondrously enchanting worlds created by Dr. Seuss and Disney, which fertilized my drive to invent worlds of my very own growing up, and still, to this day.
I tend to gravitate towards humorous stories about social ineptitude, mad science, the supernatural, and wonderfully addictive, perfectly imperfect, B-movie-like humor and exaggerated characters. I love diving down the rabbit hole of my mind and exploring strange new worlds.
"All we can do, Scully, is pull the thread and see what it unravels." (Fox Mulder, The X-Files)
Tell me more about your journey as an author, including the writing processes.
I have been illustrating since I was a child. It was my way of interacting with the world around me. I had difficulty making friends, and I found solace in pen and paper. I’m on the spectrum, so my stories tend to revolve around atypical characters. I have difficulty drawing “cute” and generic things, and I usually stick with weirdness in all its forms, including dark humor. I’m always illustrating every day. I wake up to it and fall asleep half an hour after finishing for the day. I rarely take breaks or leave the house. I generally have about 10 picture books in process at any time, and I’ll switch back and forth between them, depending on my mood and inspiration. I find it helpful to sometimes step back from a project and focus on another subject when I feel “blocked” or uninspired. I prefer to let my illustrations do the talking, but I’ve found that people don’t always understand the messages in my art, so I began pairing them with short stories…usually rhyming. I have an affinity for rhyming, and I find it adds a whimsical angle to my illustrations, which can seem pretty dark at times…But the intention is always for there to be light-hearted humor involved. It might be dark and twisted, and some people might not always get it, but the humor is there.
Books like The Gashlycrumb Tinies, and All My Friends Are Dead might seem depressing and repellant to some people, but to me they are like candy…and I can’t get enough of them. Unfortunately, there isn’t really a genre for adult picture books (which there absolutely should be), but I’m happy working in my little niche, even though the audience isn’t big. My hope is that, one day, adults will enjoy picture books in the same way that adults now enjoy cartoon shows geared towards them, rather than cartoons only being for kids. Agents don’t prefer rhyming books because they don’t rhyme when translated into other languages…and that’s a fair outlook. But I feel that if a book rhymes in one language and not in another, at least that rhyming will add an extra layer of whimsy and playfullmess to the book for those who read in that language. The book can still be great when not rhyming too…but why not rhyme when can? It sure makes songs more enjoyable.
I’ve always had trouble categorizing my books neatly into a specific genre and demographic…especially those with a large audience. Maybe that’s why I’ve always had trouble pitching my books to agents. I wouldn’t know, because they don’t leave feedback, or just don’t respond at all to my queries.
I imagine they had the same problem with Beetlejuice when gathering round the table to decide what it is…”is it a comedy, horror, drama…sci-fi, fantasy? Is it for kids or adults? Just what the heck is it? And who do we market it to?” And yet they went ahead producing it and it was a success. And we still don’t know what category it falls into…but people love it, nevertheless.
Tell me about your Book
Peculiar People and the Pets Who Love Them…lovingly written and illustrated by me, is a darkly-whimsical and addictively-humorous picture book that tells the stories of 12 fantastically weird people and their equally strange and adoring pets.
These stories revolve around characters who are gloriously abnormal. They embrace that attribute, and don't shy away from being their unique, spectacular selves. Like Madam Rosette and her poodle, Josette, who only enjoy "bad" smells…or Samurai Megasaki, who is addicted to water but also allergic to it. Each 2-page spread welcomes you into wondrous, stunningly detailed, vibrant illustrations, and stories that are guaranteed to capture your imagination and tickle your grey matter. Each time you explore it, you'll discover new secrets and symbolism that delve you deeper into captivating worlds you will inexorably fall in love with.
Story
All the stories in this book are a part of me in some way, but one story that I’m particularly proud of, in terms of the illustration execution and messaging, and the rhythmic nature of the rhyme coming together, would have to be that of Madam Rosette and Her French Poodle, Josette.
It goes:
“Rosette and her poodle dress fancy each night.
Together, they stand by the street corner light.
Like clockwork, they remain for precisely 1 hour,
turning up their noses at all who alight.
You see, they have conditions exceedingly rare;
their senses of smell are reversed and quite strong.
In fact, the only smell they can stand to inhale,
is the 3 a.m. sewage the tide brings along.
It’s pungent, compelling, and it’s truly delightful.
It’s blissfully inhaled ‘til it finally lies…
deep in their nostrils where it provides a reprieve,
from that insufferable bakery across their street baking pies.”
About the Author
I'm an illustrator and writer, and I've always loved expressing myself on paper...the ability to work within a space where I can make anything happen has always been a form of therapy for me. It's one of the reasons I love the Fantasy and Sci-Fi genres so much.
"That's the wonderful thing about crayons. They can take you to more places than a starship." (Guinan, Star Trek: The Next Generation)
I share an affinity for dark humor with some of my atypical real-life superheroes, like Tim Burton, Charles Addams, Edward Gorey, and Wes Anderson. Of course, I can't leave out the wondrously enchanting worlds created by Dr. Seuss and Disney, which fertilized my drive to invent worlds of my very own growing up, and still, to this day.
I tend to gravitate towards humorous stories about social ineptitude, mad science, the supernatural, and wonderfully addictive, perfectly imperfect, B-movie-like humor and exaggerated characters. I love diving down the rabbit hole of my mind and exploring strange new worlds.
"All we can do, Scully, is pull the thread and see what it unravels." (Fox Mulder, The X-Files) --This text refers to the paperback edition.
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