Which is cool news, and what with all the madness of World Fantasy Con, and post-World Fantasy, and getting ready to go off to make the short film, there are lots of things I haven't posted or had a chance to post, like the marvellous review of TWO PLAYS FOR VOICES at the Green Man Review site.
On Nov 3rd you wrote - "DreamHaven used to try to get Diamond to sell the double CD "Warning:Contains Language" and Diamond never quite seemed able to make it happen"
I don't think that's quite right, because my local comic shop doesn't get anything from anywhere other than Diamond, and I bought Warning: Contains Language from them ages ago. The thing to keep in mind about Diamond is that their catalogue only appears to be sorted; it's perfectly normal to find a slipcased limited edition or two listed under "apparel";. My trick is to bug the staff at the shop until they search the MS Excel sheet that they actually order from for things I suspect should be listed somewhere. If I didn't get them to do this, I'd miss all sorts of things - I never would have known there was a special "singed" edition of Coraline if I hadn't done this...
Speaking of which, do you know if the (hopefully only delicately crisped) special editions ever got shipped out to the shops?
Evie
Oh Diamond have certainly sporadically sold Warning: Contains Language. Back in 1994ish when it came out, it took them many years to understand that that was the title, though -- they originally listed it as "Untitled Neil Gaiman CD" and added a special warning about all the obscenities. There were certainly difficulties getting them to order it and stock it properly on the 2001 reissue, although they did again in the end.
Diamond don't appear to be stocking "TWO PLAYS FOR VOICES" or the Coraline Audio.
Diamond definitely shipped out the signed and numbered Coralines, yes, as I've personalised and drawn rats in some for people already.
A lady at World Fantasy Con had dozens of the glow-in-the-dark-covered Diamond edition Coralines, which she'd bought by calling Borders after Borders and getting them to go and look in the SF shelves for it. (Lots of comic shops were shorted on their orders, as Diamond sold about a third of the print run to Borders Bookshops, rather bizarrely.)
Hi -- Have you read John Collier? He wrote "His Monkey Wife" and some very funny stories about angels and demons, etc. I remember an anthology of his stuff ("The Best of John Collier") from the mid-1970s, when I was a kid.
He seems like your sort of thing, but I haven't seen a mention in your interviews.
Ah, you should do a search for Collier on the website with the Search tool. You'll find him here. (And in the introduction to SMOKE AND MIRRORS, as well.)
Several questions about the short story "A Study In Emerald", which I read at World Fantasy. It'll appear next year in an anthology called SHADOWS OVER BAKER STREET, edited by Michael Reaves and John Pelan, to be published by Del Ray.
Hello!
I am currently taking a theatre history course, and really wanted to write my final paper on Punch and Judy shows, their history, how the characters evolved, etc - but I'm having a lot of trouble finding books. Where did you find the information that you used to write Mr Punch, and could you suggest a few books for me? If not, I'm stuck with stock characters in Commedia Dell'Arte, which isn't all too bad, but has been done to death.
thanks so much!
-jessie
Well, a good starting place is http://www.punchandjudy.com/home.htm. There's a good list of books at http://www.spyrock.com/nadafarm/html/punch-booklist.html. There's even a PDF file of the Cruikshank book there. And this page from the same site, http://www.spyrock.com/nadafarm/html/punchpage.html has links to part of the Henry Mayhew interview with a Punch Man from Mayhew's wonderful "London Labour and the London Poor" (one of my favourite books in the whole world. Like a non-fiction Dickens novel that goes on forever in all direrctions.)
Hi, Neil -
Not a FAQ at all, but rather a thank you for posting Jonathan Carroll's tour schedule on your journal. He is coming to my store November 11th, and I appreciate the extra publicity! Mr. Carroll is a terrific writer and anyone who reads your work is sure to appreciate that. So your readers, where ever they live, should try to go see him!
Thanks again,
Rachel Ray
Events Coordinator, Joseph-Beth Booksellers
161 Lexington Green Circle
Lexington, KY 40503
You're welcome. And I agree.