I Wish I Had An Evil Twin, and fourteen other songs

Am away from home for a few days for meetings. Because I had to leave rather earlier than I thought I did, I forgot things. (I'm not at my best early in the morning. And by the same token, erupting volcanoes can be a trifle noisy and Mae West was not famously flat-chested.) Very nearly found myself without a computer, which would not have been a good thing, since one of the things that I forgot was my AC adapter, and I cheerfully ran down the batteries on the plane. Luckily, I have an ace assistant in Lorraine, and half an hour after I realised I was powercordless a man knocked on the door and handed me a power cord adapter, and I gave him some money, and the world was magically good again.

I also wrote more Anansi Boys on the plane.

Hey Neil!

How's your current book coming?

-Brian


I don't know. I think it may be going okay. It's a different kind of book to anything I've written before, and I have no idea if it's going to work. But I'm enormously enjoying it right now. I learned all about Rosie's mother's wax fruit today (and, for that matter, all about Rosie's mother) and I think I've figured out both what Fat Charlie does for a living, and what Fat Charlie ought to be doing for a living, and why he doesn't do it. And these are good things to know.

And seeing a lot of people have asked, Anansi Boys really isn't an American Gods sequel. The Shadow novella, "The Monarch of the Glen", in Legends II, is definitely a sequel. The next batch of Shadow in London stories will be sequels. The book where Shadow goes back to America will be a sequel. Anansi Boys really is a book which shares a character from American Gods, who really was on loan from Anansi Boys anyway. I think it's a comic novel, which may get scary toward the end. But right now I'm in the first half so it's still a comic novel.

I'm hoping to add a voice to make this a frequently enough asked question to get answered. In the journal you mention that the event at the Fitzgerald was a two hour show. I unfortunately could not make it to St. Paul to witness it myself. Today's (Monday) midmorning show d/l contained 53 minutes of a fabulous conversation with a delightfully creepy song followed by two young questioners and your answers. Where is the rest?

I'm afraid it's edited -- there was a whole hour of Q&A, and they picked their two favourite questions. So unless someone was helpfully bootlegging it, I don't know how you could hear the whole thing.

Mr. Gaiman--
A e-friend from Minneapolis told me that at an event in St. Paul on Sunday, 2/15, a little girl asked if you "had nightmares." My buddy did not relate your answer. What did, or would, you reply? I can't envision you responding with only a mundane "Yes." I am intrigued. Note: I love YA, thought CORALINE incredible, and gave my copy to me niece to read. (I am just exploring the blogs; my e-buddy raves about this site. I, of course, love your work!!!)

Luckily, one of the two questions they picked, was the little girl who asked if I had nightmares. You can listen to the interview and find out what I told her (actually something I think I once said on this journal, answering the same question) -- go to http://www.mpr.org/www/books/titles/gaiman_coraline/index.shtml and the link is in the box on the left of the page.

I am curious about your reply...

Step 1: Open your MP3 player.
Step 2: Put all of your music on random.
Step 3: Write down the first fifteen songs it plays, no matter how embarrassing.

thank you

I did this on the plane, and it was a very cool and odd list, which I wrote down as they came up -- and then I changed batteries without properly shutting things down, and lost the whole list. So I shall do it again...

mr zebra -tori amos
I'm Crazy bout my baby - Fats Waller
No Time to be 21 -- Adverts
Glass, Concrete and Stone -- david byrne
Danger Zone -- Elvis Costello
Sword of Damocles - Lou Reed
People Say - Dixie Cups
Club 18-30 - Len Bright Combo (Wreckless Eric really)
I Wish I Had an Evil Twin - Magnetic Fields
Have You Heard - Thea Gilmore
ant - They Might Be Giants
510304, episode 761 "Jack Goes to the Dentist" - Jack Benny Show
Bride of Rain Dog - Tom Waits
Is She Weird - Pixies
Getting Married Today -- Company (Sondheim)

...which is rather a normal sort of a bunch of songs (and one radio show) really. The first list had Vincent Price reading Edgar Allan Poe, and Conlan Nancarrow on it, Kathy Acker with the Mekons, and Tom Russell's "Touch of Evil" and was dangerously eclectic. That one looks more just like the kind of stuff I like. (Incidentally, it's a 40G iPod, with, it says 6858 songs on it, although a lot of those songs are spoken word things.)

There. G'night...