We wanted the book [Paper Girls] to feel to evoke the '80s, but not necessarily feel that it was drawn then.

It starts with the writing. We have to think of all these characters - we have to treat them all equally. We have to think of them as having an interior life and having motivations. When I'm drawing female characters, I'm looking for that. I'm looking for subtext. I'm looking for ways to make the reader relate to them in a way that goes beyond the pure aesthetic value. You know, just drawing an attractive woman really gets kind of boring after a while.

One of my favorite comics is Love and Rockets by the Hernandez Brothers. They do such a wonderful job of showing you how the character of Maggie ages and really doesn't present that with any kind of judgment.

Matt Wilson, the colorist, has this great palate [in Paper Girls] that brings up all these emotions and this feel of the '80s without being actually as kind of as bright and primary as it could have been.

With Erin [from Paper Girls], I wanted to show what she might look like when she's 40, and I wanted it to feel authentic. In terms of inspiration I ended up using my wife for a lot of it. Just to kind of to give me almost an anchor so that I would be invested in making this character real.

[Paper Girls] is very much is about how we are thinking about our past and growing up.

I want her to be powerful on these covers, and sometimes that's a quiet power and other times it's a more bombastic power. But when you're going to have a book out there that's called Wonder Woman and she's on it, you have a responsibility to put out a certain kind of image.