Above: Spider Man by Marvel. Jerome Maida has
a weekly comic book column that focus exclusively
on comics and sci-fi. Maida has a weekly column in
the Philadelphia Daily News' YO! section. He has a
column in the Phila. Front Page News, online,
www.frontpagenews.us also as a FPN Columnist. And
Jerome Maida is a FPN Managing Editor.
The Front Page News would like to welcome Jerome Maida to it's staff.
Jerome graduated from King's College in Wilkes-Barre in 1992 with a degree in Mass Communications and concentration in Journalism.
"My grades were good, but the intangibles I got from attending King's were invaluable", says Jerome. "They really prepare you for the outside world."
Upon graduation, Jerome immediately immediately found steady freelance work with "The Times Leader" in Wilkes-Barre. In a sign of things to come, his first professional story was about the 30th Anniversary of Spider-Man.
The next few years, he also freelanced for other small publications in the Scranton area, including "The Champion" sports paper (where he eventually became Managing Editor before that publication folded); "The Susquehanna Independent" and "The Wayne Independent".
Jerome cites his flexibility as the key to his finding freelance work for a variety of publications on a regular basis.
"I just have an interest in and am able to write about a variety of subjects", he says. "A lot of writers only want to write about sports or only want to write about entertainment and feature stories or only want to do politics and hard news. By being able to write about many different kinds of subjects, I have made life easier for the editors I have worked with.
Maida moved to Philadelphia in 1997 and soon translated his versatility (and love of the comic book genre) into a successful freelance stint at the "Philadelphia Daily News" starting in 2000.
"I have loved comic books since I was a kid and with movies like 'X-Men' and 'Spider-Man' being so successful, it was a subject they wanted to cover in depth that not many writers knew a lot about", says Jerome. "So that quickly became my niche. I was soon officially known as the Comics Guy."
His comics writing was so well received that in 2006 he was given his only weekly comic book column that would focus exclusively on comics and sci-fi. Jerome's column continues to the present day and is published every Monday in the Philadelphia Daily News' YO! section.
Jerome's expertise in comics has also gotten him published in the "Philadephie Tribune"; "The Morning Call" in Allentown, PA; "Electric City" in Scranton, PA; "Diamond City" in Wilkes-Barre, PA; and "The Villager" in Moscow, PA.
Jerome cites interviews with Patrick Stewart, William Shatner, Nana Visitor, Stan Lee and Joss Whedon as some of his biggest thrills.
"When some of these stars, who you know have been interviewed scores of times, tell you that they enjoyed an interview with you because they were asked original questions, that's a great feeling", says Jerome.
