Spiderwick Green

Holly Black invited Maddy to a screening of The Spiderwick Chronicles last night, and I drove her and her friend Anna-Rose, and went in with them as one of Maddy's "plus two". (I skipped out on seeing Hannah Montana 3D last week when I did chauffeur duty, and sat in the next door Starbucks and wrote The Graveyard Book instead, and it was only when the girls came out that I learned that it had the 3D Coraline teaser before the movie.) Anyway, I really enjoyed TSC, much more than I thought I was going to from the teasers they showed at San Diego, and tried to get Maddy to review it here ("Da-aad. Just say Maddy really liked it.") and then to get Anna Rose to review it here ("Er. Just say that Anna Rose really liked it."). So no review, but Maddy and Anna Rose really liked it.

2 questions that other readers of your blog may be interested in also:

I searched your site, but saw no mention of the upcoming Sandman and Death bookends. I love most of the Sandman statues, and these look really cool, so I will probably pick them up. My question is, is this replacing the large slipcase designed to hold the 4 absolute Sandman volumes that you have mentioned in the past? If the slipcase is still planned, will it be able to contain the individual slipcases as well, or just the books?

On another note, is there any truth to the rumor of an Absolute Death collection to accompany the Sandman volumes?

Thanks for the writing, and for the blog.

-Neil




Dear Neil (good name that, correctly spelled, well done)

I think we decided that a master slipcase to hold four books already each in a slipcase was a bit redundant. (Maybe we can do a master slipcase or two for the ten Sandman Library volumes one day.) So it's just the bookends, which Mark Buckingham designed and which he and the people at DC and the sculptor have been working on for many, many months now. (Click on the photo to see it a bit bigger. Each bookend is over 8 inches tall and over six inches wide)

The DEATH volume won't be an absolute. It'll be oversized, though, in the Deluxe Edition format, and probably be called THE COMPLEAT DEATH because that's what we've been calling it for the last decade.

Dear Neil,

I just found this blog and thought of you:

http://lolthulhu.com/

You probably already know it...I'm just making sure.

Also, while I don't usually like book reviews...when I was in high-school, I knew synesthesia and the Midgard serpent. I also knew Mandelbrot (if only as "that guy who makes math into freaky pictures"). Admittedly, I've always been a little weirder than most people.


Best wishes!

K.

I've never posted Lolthulhu, have I? Despite people letting me know about it as long ago as last Hallowe'en. Well, it's up now.

And yes, I wasn't sure about the logic of the "bright high school kids all know celebrity gossip from thirty years ago" line in the review. Some things don't change. The whole point of that line was to show what sorts of things Joey didn't know. (Shrugs.)

Hey Neil...since you seem to be always open to nifty, original websites, I found one that I think is splindifferously wonderful. This guy takes drawings done by children and recreates them in photographic form. It really goes to show both the photographer's ingenuity, and more importantly, the creativity of children's minds. WONDERFUL site. I hope you like it.

http://www.yeondoojung.com/wonderland.html

Oh, and you totally need one of these. If I had money to spend, I would definitely get you one as a gift. :)

http://www.datamancer.net/keyboards/keyboards.htm


That first website is fascinating. And I really want to sit down at one of those keyboards and find out what it feels to type on them...

Over at http://outofthiseos.typepad.com/blog/2008/02/a-note-on-audio.html
my Harper Collins editor Jennifer's assistant Kate (who is also editing in her own write) talks about the pluses and minuses of audiobooks and driving, from her experiences with Neverwhere...

Right. On with the day. (I'm doing some overdue introductions right now. Then Chapter 8.)

pretty vacant

In my quest to give you things to read while I'm off scribbling things, my old schoolfriend Geoff Notkin (you can find him not going to prison here and being taught by Will Eisner here) was recently seen hunting for meteorites on the Discovery Channel's Cash Or Treasures. He writes about it on his website at http://www.aerolite.org/cash-and-treasures.htm. (If you own a copy of Sandman:The Kindly Ones, you can see a photo in the back of Geoff -- and me, and Graham K Smith -- as punks in 1976.)

And for the readers in the Philippines (and there are a lot of you)... Kristin writes to say that We're organizing a two-day literary convention--the Read or Die Convention 2007--which will be held on February 3-4 2007 at the Hotel Intercon, Makati City. It's to promote reading, support for Filipino readers, and more public awareness of Filipino literature. The event is non-profit and all the proceeds will be donated to AHON Foundation, an organization which refurbishes public elementary school libraries. The event is supported by the National Book Development Board, the Department of Education and UNICEF.The convention website is here: http://read-or-die.org/rodcon/

and she adds

We'd also like to solicit donations from people who live abroad, if that's possible, in order to supplement the amount which will be donated to our beneficiary (and we hope that we can still earmark some funds left over--if there will be any leftover money--for other organizations which need it. We've just learned, for example, that Books For The Barrios (http://www.booksforthebarrios.com), a group based in America which organizes book drives for the benefit of our public school libraries is in danger of closing its operations due to lack of support. The vice-president got in touch with us via RodCon and asked us to help).

and something for you to look at (if you haven't seen it already)...

Have you seen this? Ron Mueck is this incredible artist who makes shockingly realistic sculptures of people. Either that, or he kills giants and embalms them. I hope you enjoy it. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/gallery/2005/12/29/GA2005122900888_index_frames.htm?startat=1