House thoughts, and some unanswered questions on art and commerce

It's a very strange process, moving into a new house. In my case, the worst of the moving in has been done. Now all that remains is details, hundreds upon hundreds of details. Details and details and details and, occasionally, small disasters. Yesterday, the heating stopped working. The heating stopped working because there was two inches of water in the cellar, because a water treatment pump could not keep up with the combination of rain and snowmelt that was already filling all the drains, and so backed up. I have good friends and they made everything okay, with pumps and knowledge of fixing things.

(I do not really have a lot of fixing things knowledge. And while you may want to read a book by me, you do not want me to put up your shelves. Trust me on this.)

I went into New York overnight, finished writing a very much overdue introduction in my hotel room, emailed it off moments before I fell asleep, had a Really Cool Secret Meeting this morning, and am typing this on the train back, the Hudson river grey and, on the far bank, distant leafless hills and cliffs. I want Spring to begin.

I'm currently pondering whether or not to write a short story for a company. They've asked me to write one. I can write whatever I like, as long as I put their product in it and do not show their product killing people horribly, or even nicely. It would be a fun, interesting project that would pay well.  To make things more interesting, I've already mentioned their product in a novel, I like their product, and I can see where the story would go.

But I'm not sure. I'm going back and forth on it.

I loved doing last year's project for BlackBerry, mostly because it felt like they were a patron of the arts. They gave me a very open brief ("What would you like to do on social media?") and let me go off and do it. They gave me a BlackBerry, and I promised I'd use it for a year. They made short films which I loved, about writing and inspiration and creation.

(And I just noticed that the BlackBerry Keep Moving videos have become unlisted on YouTube, so here they all are, in case anyone needs them. The fourth is my favourite.)



(As a note here: when the year was up, I wanted to stay with BlackBerry as a phone platform. I really liked it, and kept finding myself frustrated when I'd use iPhones or Android phones, but I was grumpy about the lack of apps. They gave me a Z30. It's a wonderful phone (here's the USA Today write up.) But y'know, like they said in the USA Today review, no Yelp and no Netflix.

But then, a couple of weeks after I got the Z30, they released the latest operating system, 10.2.1, which also now natively runs Android apps. I archived on my old Android phone any Android apps I wanted on the Z30, bluetoothed them over to the BlackBerry, installed them, and now use Yelp and Netflix and Audible and such on the BlackBerry with abandon.)

But the BlackBerry project, while it was done for and with the assistance of BlackBerry, never meant I had to put a BlackBerry into a story. Which made me happy. Now I'm trying to figure out why that would have felt like crossing a line in the way that the Nokia phone (which, if I were writing it today, would be an iPhone) in the first chapter of American Gods does not. And what that line is. And why it troubles me.

...

Getting ready for the Art Speigelman conversation at Bard on Friday. We plan to talk a whole lot.

The Symphony Space "Selected Shorts" night on May 7th has now sold out. The only other event I'll be doing in New York this year is the Big One -- the Carnegie Hall event on June 27th. (You do not want to miss this: it's the same thing that sold out Sydney Opera House, with FourPlay String Quartet and me).

Which reminds me. One final TRUTH IS A CAVE.. night has been added to the world. Edinburgh, Sunday July 6th. As they say on their website:

Created for Sydney's renowned Graphic festival, this haunting tale of adventure, revenge and treasure, told as a hybrid between a storyteller, an artists and an Australian string quartet is playing five performances only - Carnegie Hall in New York, the Warfield in San Francisco, two sold-out shows at London's Barbican, all leading up to this very special night at Usher Hall.

Here's the Usher Hall tickets link.


Ayelet Waldman asked me if I could mention that she has a new book out, and I will, and not just because I have not yet written my speech for her daughter Rosie's Bat-Mitzvah: It is called Love and Treasure. That's the Amazon link, and here's the Indiebound.

...

oops. This sat on my computer for 36 hours. In the meantime, Spring has definitely sprung. Deer are frisking through the woods and platoons of wild turkeys are self-importantly strutwaddling up and down the drive. I hope Spring heard me grumbling, and decided it was time to turn up.

Labels: art, Blackberry, cellars, commerce, Keep moving, New York

Lives on Planes, Dances on Tables

Someone on Twitter just asked if I live on planes, and right now it feels like it.

I slept in my own bed in Cambridge MA last night, but I leave in a couple of hours (if the roads are cleared of snow) for Austin TX, for the South by Southwest festival, where I will be In Conversation with Chuck Lorre about What Doesn't Kill Us Makes Us Bitter, and will be one of Marieke Hardy's People of Letters, and I will mostly spend long days recording the audiobook of THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE and the unrecorded stories of SMOKE AND MIRRORS.

Let's see: This is a beautiful thing. It's the third of the BlackBerry Keep Moving videos -- it begins with me reading the end of the February tale. It has a special guest star in artist Amadea Bailey (we were in her beautiful studio) and lots of beautiful shots of Santa Monica beach at sunset, and a recording session.

The film I'm excited about is the next one, filmed in London and Cambridge (the UK one) last week.   Well, earlier this week. Argh. They just sent it to me, and it's gorgeous.

Go and look at the amazing artwork that's coming in for the Calendar of Tales (and read/listen to them too) at http://blck.by/XXjEYE.

I was a guest at the Cambridge Watersprite International Student Film Festival last weekend -- here's a great write up of what it was like...

Other things I did in London included:

A press conference for Neverwhere. I slept through my alarm and had to race through Soho to get there not-too-late. The concerned lady at the bottom of the stairs who calmed me down and got me a much-needed cup of tea turned out to be the Controller of Radio Four. I met BERNARD CRIBBINS ( he plays Old Bailey).

Here is a photograph of Benedict Cumberbatch. He plays the angel Islington. Many of my friends strongly believe that photographs of Mr Cumberbatch and amusing photographs of kittens were what the internet was created for.

Here is a link to the absolutely wonderful BBC NEVERWHERE website.

I bumped into Stephen Fry in a Soho basement last week -- we were both there to see the Lady Rizo being amazing -- and when he found out I was doing stuff with BlackBerry & had a Z10 he sent me this essay from his blog.

I worked on a secret project with Nick Harkaway and Tom Abba.

I planned lots of things with Headline (for THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE) and with Bloomsbury (for FORTUNATELY, THE MILK). I signed some advanced reading copies of OCEAN for Headline...

I was interviewed about FORTUNATELY, THE MILK and the forthcoming UNNATURAL CREATURES anthology by Bloomsbury - a benefit book I edited, with the assistance of the remarkable Maria Dahvana Headley, for 826 DC.

Here is the AMERICAN cover of UNNATURAL CREATURES (the UK cover is not up yet):

I met several people who want me to Use whatever influence I have to Do Good, including the fabulous Other Neil and Josie Long from emerging benevolent entity Arts Emergency.

I met Alison, a representative of the UN High Commission on Refugees: the day I met her the millionth refugee  from Syria had crossed the border, fleeing the conflict. Alison told me what was happening, about the refugees, mostly mothers and children leaving their lives with only what they could carry, and what the UNHCR is doing; and I agreed, without hesitation, to come on board and help however I can. For now, that consists of telling people what's going on on the Syrian borders, and of pointing people at this website: http://goo.gl/KlLZW.

I saw Lenny Henry and Tanya (Hunter from the TV Neverwhere) Moodie starring in August Wilson's FENCES. It was huge and moving, and Lenny's performance is epic (better, in my opinion, than his award-winning Othello). I assume it's heading for London's West End, because it's the kind of thing that you know is going to wind up there. That level of quality and power. I got to hug Tanya for the first time since 1997.

I had a bunch of other meetings about things that are wonderful, or will be, and that I am not allowed to talk about yet. And then I flew home.

Somewhere in there I failed to get enough sleep.

I do not actually live on planes. I did not dance on any tables either.

Labels: also not dancing on tables, Amusing pictures of kittens not in this blog, Blackberry, fences, Keep moving, Lenny Henry, Neverwhere on the radio, Refugees, sleep, Stephen Fry, Tanya Moodie, Unnatural Creatures

Now up! Read a Calendar of Tales. And make ART.

ROUND TWO BEGINS...

Here's a video that the people at BlackBerry (who are the patrons of this project) made of me ten days ago, on the two days between the tweeting out the questions and the writing of the stories.

If you go to http://keepmoving.blackberry.com/desktop/en/us/ambassador/neil-gaiman.html you will be able to read or download a free PDF of all twelve of the stories I wrote in three days of madness last week: over 9000 words of tales, each one very different, each one inspired by a reply to a question I'd twittered to the world.

The next stage is art. I made stories inspired by replies, now I want the stories to inspire art. Something we can make a calendar out of -- an online one, perhaps a paper one as well... Go to the website to find out how.

I tried to write stories that would make pictures in people's heads. I hope I succeeded.

Yours nervously,

Neil

Labels: A Calendar of Tales, art, Authorial nervousness, Blackberry, Keep moving

A VERY late Blog, about trying to make art with a lot of people, including you...

I had planned to write this blog early this morning. And then I planned to write it while the day went on. And now the day is half over and the blog is not even begun.

So...

First of all, watch this:

...and not just for the beautiful footage of Cabal in it.

(The film was made in mid-December, and it makes me so happy-sad-happy-again to see it, and see my old dog lolloping through the snow with me.)

Over on Twitter today I've been initiating a strange and beautiful art project. It's about half way through the very first stage, which consists of throwing out questions to Twitter, and seeing what I get back.

Questions like "Why is January so Dangerous?"

or "Where would you spend a perfect June?" with the appropriate Hashtag - #JunTale in this case.

The answers have been amazing. Personal, honest, imaginative, glorious, surprising, strange, unexpected, familiar, magical, wise, funny... all of those things. They can be read over on the BlackBerry Hub for the project, and also on Twitter (just click on the relevant hashtag -- here's April's. Here's June's.)

I've been retweeting them like mad, because I loved them and wanted to spread them.

I'm also using the BlackBerry10 #KeepMoving hashtag, and because BlackBerry are the ones who are helping me do all this I'm also trying to remember to use both the #BlackBerry10 hashtag and to put the capital B in the middle of BlackBerry.

Seeing you are probably wondering: they showed me the phone in question, the Z10, for the first time in Autumn in the UK, I got to play with it, and I really liked it: the swiping the screen with your thumb "flow" things felt really natural, and it's the easiest onscreen keyboard to type with I've ever used. (I always hate onscreen keyboards and I do not hate this one. It is intelligent. I've used the first four of the five features NBC talk about here, and like them as much as they do.) (And no, nobody's asked me to say that last paragraph. If I hadn't have liked the phone I would have said no.)

So they said yes to my idea of using online communities to try and make something cool and special that brought a lot of people together, and I said yes to working with their patronage on the project.

The idea is: I'm going to make a Calendar of Tales. (Yes, I remain as obsessed with the months of the year as I have always been.) I would go to Twitter for story prompts. Then, over a handful of days, I'll write a story, one for each month. Once there are 12 stories we'll go back out to the world to get other people make art of various kinds using the stories as inspiration. One giant artistic ball of wax. Or ping pong game. Or cuddlepuddle. Or pick your own metaphor.

No, you do not have to use a BlackBerry for anything in this, although you might want to follow the @Blackberry twitter account as it would be useful for when they need to DM anyone whose tweets I do happen to use as a story prompt. (But if you don't follow them, I'll wave at you to remind you.)

In the end, we're hoping for a paper Calendar that will benefit charity, and an amazing app (or possibly a website) with all the stories, and all the art of various kinds up for everyone.

I'm enjoying this no end: it's wonderful just to throw questions out, and feel recharged and joyous.  (Actually, December did not leave me joyous. It left me wanting to hug people, and to remember how much we lose when we lose people, and animals, and ourselves from the past as we always do.)

I think I understand a lot more of how Amanda relates to Twitter, when suddenly she'll start retweeting people and use that to create a community, to link people, to make people feel less alone.

I didn't expect this bit of the project to feel like art, but watching the amount of connection it has made between people, I think perhaps it was. I felt like my heart was being broken and healed, all at the same time.

(I also do not know how recharged or joyous I will feel in a few days from now when I have finished writing 12 shortshort stories, mind you. I may be grumpy and glaring and muttering.)

If you go to http://keepmoving.blackberry.com/desktop/en/us/ambassador/neil-gaiman.html they have all the info you could need up, along with more stuff. (Scroll down the page.)

As I said, you can still suggest things: use the month and the #KeepMoving hashtags.

Tomorrow, I have to choose 12 prompts which now seems to me to be a pretty impossible sort of a task given everything that's come in, but I set the rules so cannot grumble. And then on Wednesday I start to write.

There will be a film crew watching me write. This will be VERY interesting, and it is possible I may ask them to go away, or at least to film me from a great distance.

I always envied Harlan Ellison getting to write stories in bookshop windows. Maybe it will be like that.

Labels: Blackberry, Cabal and me, Keep moving, the dangers of Twitter

The Best Advice

I was asked recently, on a stage in Sydney, what the best advice I'd ever received from another author was, and I told the Harlan Ellison shaving story I've told here. It is invaluable knowledge.

This morning I thought, I wonder what the best non-shaving advice I've actually got from another author was...? And then I knew.

It was in 1988, at the World Fantasy Convention in London, in the bar. I was with a bunch of people around a table, and had been interviewing Clive Barker about comics for a book on Clive that would be coming out. After the interview a conversational free-for-all developed -- I remember getting frustrated with Clive's view that comics were lacking something that prose had, because a novel could make him cry while a comic never had. (This was 26 years ago, remember. I have no idea at all if Clive still thinks that way, or if a comic has made him cry in the years between. I hope it has.)

And after the conversation was over, Clive took me aside. He said, "When we were talking,  you were getting louder and louder."

I had been. It was a noisy bar. And I'd had important things to say and huge opinions and dammit, I was determined to be heard.

He said, "Neil, don't do that. If you get loud, everyone else gets louder to top you. And then everyone's shouting and nobody's listening. If you want everyone to listen to you, get quieter. People will listen."

It seemed like the strangest advice I'd ever received. But I loved and respected Clive, so the next time I was in a bar argument/conversation, I lowered my voice. And the more I wanted to be heard the quieter I forced myself to get. I lowered my voice...

And people lowered theirs. They leaned in. They listened. I didn't have to raise my voice.

I felt like I'd been given one of the keys to the universe.

And so I pass it on to you.

Clive's been having some health issues recently, and I hope they are soon over and he's back to full strength. He was an inspiration in every way when I was in my early twenties, and I've learned so much from him over the years. Here's a photo of us from 1989 on the Nightbreed set stolen from his Facebook page.

...

Monday at midday Eastern Time, the first part of the mad make good art project I'm doing with the assistance of Blackberry will begin.  It'll be happening (to begin with) on Twitter. I'm @Neilhimself there (some people might not know this). I'll keep you updated with links and such on here, too.

...

Right. I'm at home. The home in the midwest.  Lots of cool things waiting for me here, including a bunch of books, one of which is the new edition of American Gods -- for the first time, the US edition of the Author's Preferred Text is out in paperback. (It's also the first of the New Uniform US Paperback covers to come out and will be released in a few days.) It's in the bottom second from the right...

(Also shown, two foreign editions of Sandman, three books that include short stories by me, a book I love with an afterword by me, and my copy of a great guide to where you start reading an author -- I got it because I backed the Kickstarter, not because there is a chapter on where to start reading me written by the outrageously talented Erin Morgenstern.)

It's cold here. But I'm wearing long underwear and will dress warmly and am about to take Lola for a walk down to the lamppost in the woods. Will post a photo if I get a good one.

Yes, the house feels empty and strange. But Lola is a sweet and loving dog. And I am writing things.

(The little flashlight around her neck is not really so that she can see better in the dark. It's so I can see her in the night.)

Labels: advice, american gods tenth anniversary edition, Blackberry, Clive Barker, Keep moving, Lola