Interview with J.D. Amato and Sophie Morse, Author and Illustrator of The Endless Game

Today, we're joined by J.D. Amato and Sophie Morse, the author and illustrator of the graphic novel The Endless Game: A middle school boy gets drawn into his new town’s intense summer game of capture the flag in this “thrilling…often profound” (Booklist, starred review) slice-of-life graphic novel debut perfect for fans of The Cardboard Kingdom and Craig of the Creek.

For J.D.: 

Please tell us a bit about The Endless Game. It’s based on your own experiences growing up, but how did you go from the Chicago suburbs to a fictional town with the kind of sprawling mythology of Lakeside? 

Great question! I tried to write a mythology that matched what my memories felt like as a kid, rather than just copy the literal details. Back then, the stakes to our small problems felt huge and the possibilities of our games felt enormous. So, I just tried to write a world where those feelings were true!

Photo Credit: Sela Shiloni

You’ve worked in visual media before (TV). How did writing for television translate to graphic novels?

In television we have to take a lot of leaps of faith to trust that the audience will connect the dots of storytelling in their mind that we don’t show explicitly. So, I carried that with me into the graphic novel world and trusted that kids would be savvy enough to process temporal jumps and implied narrative! In many ways, I think once they understand the visual language, kids can actually be better than adults at filling in the world of a story that isn’t explicitly on the page.

You deal with some pretty heavy topics through a kids’ game. It almost makes the entire heaviness of laws and history and institutions seem more approachable to a young audience, or puts politics in terms that are immediately digestible to this readership. Was that the goal?

Kids take on the feelings of what’s going on in the world around them, even if they might not understand the exact mechanisms. So, I just tried to work backwards from the pressures I felt growing up, and then make those real in the story world of the characters.

For Sophie: 

This is your graphic novel debut as well, I believe. What was the experience of illustrating an entire 250-page work? 

It was intense! But very fulfilling. There was a lot to learn but I’m grateful now to have these skills for future projects. It was definitely very satisfying to complete a page step-by-step and then have a really cool finished product in front of you.

Photo Credit: Eliza Morsesophiem

Can you say a bit about the process of character creation? How did you keep each character visually distinct?

Keeping each character distinct and recognizable was a really important conscious choice I made so I’m glad to see it was noticed. I wanted all the kids, including the ones that populate the background, to feel like they could have stories of their own! I collected tons of reference for the general “look” of the characters and would pull from that reference all the time. I also treated designing the characters’ features as kind of a mix-and-match game.

One thing I noticed was the use of light throughout. (I have to say I love the effect of the nighttime color palette during the climax…) How intentional was that, and did you and colorist Sara Calhoun develop that visual language together?

Every visual choice was super intentional! Color is so important in telling the story, just as important as the drawings and the words, and Sara and I definitely made sure to utilize it. We had rough palettes that we stuck to for all locations, not only to give a mood, but also so that when readers return to those locations in the story, it is easy to understand through color “Oh, I’m back in Uphill” for example. I gathered a bunch of reference on how I wanted it colored and shared that with Sara, and then she combined that reference and my own coloring style to make the final visual language you see! And yes I love how the nighttime climax came out! That was something Sara and I worked especially hard on. I didn’t want all those scenes to be darkly colored, for one, it wouldn’t print well, and two, it would be a pretty uninspiring way to portray such an epic finale. We decided to go with a palette of “nighttime colors” like blue, purple, and green, to imply night without too much darkness.

For both: 

I know you two have had a very collaborative working relationship: Sophie pitching dialogue changes, J.D. pitching blocking ideas. How did that dynamic develop?

Sophie: I think it just developed naturally. We both wanted this book to be the best it could be and we knew collaborating closely and openly communicating was the way to do it.

J.D.: It’s fun to work with someone who you trust creatively, and for us, putting the book first meant good ideas could come from anywhere. Like Sophie said, there wasn’t really an “ah ha!” moment, the drive for collaboration was just natural in how we both communicated… so if anything, it was just a byproduct of us being a good fit creatively!

J.D., I believe you sent Sophie reference photos of real North Shore locations like Skokie Lagoons and Gilson Beach. How do you balance drawing from real places and real memories while still building a world that feels like it could belong to any kid, anywhere? 

I think the fact that Sophie and I dumped both of our childhoods into the collaborative stew meant that our fictional world was never an exact replica of a singular experience… and so our hope was that the things that would remain were the feelings and energies that could belong to any kid.

What’s next?

We’re already cooking up ideas on the next installment of the series… and we both have a myriad of our own independent projects in the meantime.

Where can we find you?

Sophie: I am on Instagram @sopharium and on my site sophiemorse.com!

J.D.: I am on instagram @j.d.amato

ABOUT J.D. AMATO
J.D. Amato is a writer based in Astoria, NY. He is best known for his work as a showrunner for comedy television shows like AFTER MIDNIGHT; DESUS & MERO; MY BROTHER, MY BROTHER AND ME and THE CHRIS GETHARD SHOW. He is currently an executive producer on THE UNDERCOVERS, hosted by Eli Manning. Beyond television and film, J.D. has been a house performer at the Upright Citizen’s Brigade Theater, consulted for various magicians, performed as a mime, and once hosted a podcast where every episode was twelve hours long. He grew up in the suburbs of Chicago, and outside of writing he is an amateur distance runner and loves colorful things. His first middle grade graphic novel, The Endless Game, will be published by Simon & Schuster in April 2026.

ABOUT SOPHIE MORSE

Sophie Morse is an illustrator based in Boston, MA. She received her BFA in Illustration from RISD in 2020. She has experience in editorial, publishing, and art direction, and her past clients include Simon & Schuster, NPR, and more. Sophie illustrated the upcoming middle grade graphic novel The Endless Game, by J.D. Amato, which will be published on April 28, 2026 by Simon & Schuster. She loves making work that her tinier self would think is cool, and would definitely print out and tape to her childhood bedroom wall. When she is not drawing, she is exploring New England, haunting local graveyards, and running around at her day job as a letterpress printer.

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