Journal

Wednesday, February 08, 2006

deadline packs

The nice thing about being madly busy on a deadline is that I can answer a few questions and make it look as I'm still industriously blogging. (The me-and-Maddy-Dr-Who-DVD-Marathon continues, though. We're up to the fourth Doctor. Tonight we wrapped up The Talons of Weng Chiang, and tomorrow we start the Douglas Adams City of Death.) Also wrote a very short story for Wired Magazine.

One message saying someone had found MirrorMask onsale already at his local Wal-Mart.

Lots of messages saying things like,

I just wanted to let you know that you were mentioned on the TV Show "Bones" tonight (airs on FOX at 9pm eastern time...you might still be able to see it out where you are). Here is the episode summary:
http://www.fox.com/schedule/showinfo/bones/bon_113.htm

Basically the victim was a comic book fan and one of his friends was telling the FBI that he gave his whole "Gaiman collection" to his girlfriend (in the past). And she mentioned how much he (the character) loved your work. I thought it was pretty awesome.

Cheers!


and lots of other messages saying things like

A quick note to your readers wanting to get at something that used to be on a web site:

Always try http://web.archive.org/, the Internet Wayback Wachine. It has incarnations of neilgaiman.com from before it became the site you know today:
http://web.archive.org/web/19990125101526/http://www.neilgaiman.com/
or
http://web.archive.org/web/20000304130048/http://www.neilgaiman.com/

Which of course includes the recently removed older photo of you:
http://web.archive.org/web/20030602111404/www.neilgaiman.com/images/home/image_top.gif
Craig Steffen


I loved the idea of doing the CSS thing (http://www.csszengarden.com/?cssfile=/184/184.css&page=0) and letting people create "skins" for the blog, but the reply I got from our webmistress, Stephanie, was As for the reader’s suggestion: I’m told this is extremely difficult to implement as this was not considered before the site was created, and involves the integration of many different web technologies. Also, every "skin" submitted would have to be tested on all major browsers and platforms as we did for the current site to make sure it looked correct for each user. Coupled with that, it would require hours of testing for each skin created to fix any bugs. Which seems to be a polite way of saying no.

Hello,

You recently posted (entry: Deadline Doom) about the Danish cartoons depicting Muhammad, and mentioned that Danish Muslims, "...took the pictures, along with some more that they apparently made up..." Do you have an article or other source with more information on the fake cartoons? It's not that I don't generally trust you as a source, but it's not in the you link to below that line, and I'm curious about it.

Thanks,

-Christina


Google news gives a lot of links -- here's one from the BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4693292.stm while google gives a link to a blog with the images on at http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2006/02/islamic-society-of-denmark-used-fake.html

By the way, I really enjoyed this article on the matter by Christopher Hitchens -- http://www.slate.com/id/2135499.

Hi Neil, I just got rejected from a creative writing class at my college and wanted to know--has this, or anything similar, ever happened to you? I have this rather strong conviction that I am a writer, but if I can't so much as make it into a class, I'm not sure if I've got much hope of ever being published. Any personal experience with the whole rejection ordeal that might help me put this in perspective? If you've got the time, it'd be quite heartening to hear. Thanks very much.

Normally I'd suggest you use the neilgaiman.com Search facility, but currently it seems more than a bit dodgy -- at least, it's not searching the blog itself, so you're best off using a google with site:neilgaiman.com and then whatever you're searching for. In this case it would be Creative Writing, which would take you straight to http://www.neilgaiman.com/journal/2004/02/on-writing.asp, which may help...

Mirrormask was advertised on Columbia House Video's website. I was ready to buy it, when I realized there was no mention of close captioning. I checked technical details & there's no mention of whether the movie is subtitled on the DVD. Do you have any ideas where I might be able to find this out? I don't want to buy something I won't be able to comprehend... thanks in advance, and thanks so much for writing those wonderful books. I gave our local independent bookseller (Randy Glumm of Waystation Books) my copy of Anasazi Boys & am hoping he likes it as much as I did.

I did a quick google and found http://www.cduniverse.com/productinfo.asp?pid=6998674 where I learned that the DVD Features are:

Region 1
Keep Case
Wide Screen
Audio:
Dolby 5.1 - English, Portuguese, Thai
Dolby Surround Sound - French
Subtitles - Chinese - Optional
Subtitles - English - Optional
Subtitles - French - Optional
Subtitles - Korean - Optional
Subtitles - Portuguese - Optional
Subtitles - Spanish - Optional
Subtitles - Thai - Optional
Additional Release Material:
Commentary - Director/Writer
Featurettes:

1. Neil Gaiman
2. Dave McKean talks about the film
3. Beginnings
4. Cast & Crew
5. Day 16
6. Flight of the Monkeybirds
7. Giants Development
Questions & Answers


So it definitely has English subtitles.

Is there any chance of which you are aware that "The Wolves in the Walls" may be staged in the US? That is absolutely one of my favorite of your books, and I could see a stge production being a lot of fun.
Thanks,
Christy


According to the Improbable Theatre website -- http://www.improbable.co.uk/show_example.asp?item_id=14 The Wolves in the Walls will tour again across the UK in Autumn 2006 and will travel to the USA in Spring 2007


Hi Neil,

I'm a staff member at a university doing a presentation of American Gods at a luncheon we have once a month to share books we love with others. During the discussion, I was hoping to play an audio or video clip of you reading from American Gods (I'm in IT and I'd love to show faculty how easy it is use computers in their classroom). I found a link on the site to an audio clip at a CBLDF function, but the link was down. Just wondering if there might another place I could find such a clip?

I know not every question get answered, but I still want to go ahead and say thank you. If it goes well I hope to do another presentation on your children's books and one on Anansi Boys.

Thanks again,
Shannon Phillips
Charleston, SC


Sorry that the link is currently dead -- I don't honestly know why the audio and video clips from the old site (http://web.archive.org/web/20030605122755/www.neilgaiman.com/audio/audio.asp) aren't currently up and available. I've written to the webpeople and asked about it, and I hope we can get it back up soon enough for you to use it.

(Actually this might be a good time to put up a general sort of a call for good quality recordings of me doing readings and suchlike -- if you have any, either stored away, or up on your site, let me know what you've got.)
...

Charles deLint reviews Anansi Boys at http://www.sfsite.com/fsf/2006/cdl0603.htm. It's a fascinating and, I suspect, perceptive, review, with a really interesting idea about narrative voice.

And finally, http://www.sacurrent.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=16086463&BRD=2318&PAG=461&dept_id=484045&rfi=6 is a review and roundup of a few of the recent books on comics out there...