A Picture of the Cat of Doom

It got cold. The air smells amazing, the mosquitoes have gone, the sky is a perfect blue and summer is over.

My friend Kyle Cassidy is out here for a few days to shoot photographs of Miss Maddy, and also shoot Lorraine's first ever Roller Derby Bout on Saturday with the Chippewa Valley Roller Girls. He and I went for a walk in the night and wore warm coats, and played Children of the Corn in the meadow, and you could smell the distant winter on the air.

Actually, I should clarify. The above things are what Kyle is officially here to shoot. Unofficially, he's here for the cats. This is his iphone picture of Princess looking like the Cat of Doom from a horror movie.

...

Tickets go on sale today, Friday the 16th, for the EVENING WITH NEIL AND AMANDA shows we're doing in November, for all the stops except San Francisco, which goes on sale on Sunday. Given the speed with which the tickets released for presale for Vancouver and San Francisco sold out today, you may want to get your orders in early - as near to ticket release time as you can. (10 am for everywhere except Portland, where it is 11 am because they like their mornings in Portland.)

October 31st
LOS ANGELES, CA
Wilshire Ebell Theatre
Tickets go on sale Friday, 9/16 at 10AM PDT.
http://www.ticketmaster.com/event/09004728855F4205

(Costumes! It's Hallowe'en in Los Angeles. We'll suggest that people wear costumes.)

November 4th

SAN FRANCISCO, CA
Palace of Fine Arts
Tickets go on sale Sunday 9/18 at 10AM PDT.

http://www.ticketmaster.com/event/1C00472C7527579B

November 6th

VANCOUVER, BC
Vogue Theatre
Tickets go on sale 9/16 at 10:00am.
https://tickets.voguetheatre.com/Online/

November 8th

PORTLAND, OR
Aladdin Theatre
Tickets go on sale 9/16 at 11am PDT.
http://www.ticketmaster.com/event/0F004728D41C4F13

SEATTLE, WA

Moore Theatre

Tickets go on sale at 9/16 at 10 AM PDT

http://purchase.tickets.com/buy/TicketPurchase?pid=7109675

...

Let's see. My old friend and collaborator Dave McKean was made an honorary Doctor of Design in Wolverhampton. I do not think I have ever seen him look so uncomfortable as in these photos. Wish he'd kept the hat on, though.

Which is to say, congratulations Dave.

If you're in the UK, get to Foyles to see Dave's "Magic of Reality" exhibition http://www.foyles.co.uk/Public/Events/Detail.aspx?eventId=1338- the original art he made for the book he's just done with Richard Dawkins is on display.

...

I meant to link to the One Book One Chicago site. They had people make books, literally: reinvent and rebind the books that were One Book One Chicago choices over the years. Audrey Niffenegger was one of the judges. A Neverwhere won. Read all about it, and see many of the books at http://onebookonechicago.tumblr.com/post/9588689435/one-book-many-interpretations

...

Here's the World Book Night list of the Hundred Best Loved Books in the UK: http://www.worldbooknight.org/your-books/the-wbn-top-100-books

Books of mine got into the top hundred several times. Well, four and half times. (Good Omens being the half, shared with Terry Pratchett.) Which is really thrilling. The books, with links to each book, and the votes they got are at http://www.worldbooknight.org/your-books/the-wbn-interactive-top-100-books

..

Right. Sleep now. How on earth did it get this late?

Labels: an evening with neil and amanda, I do not have an honorary doctorate but am now holding out for a dukedom, kyle cassidy, Princess, world book night

I have Mythological Dimensions. You cannot see them, but they are there.

The lump on Princess's face turns out to have been the equivalent of a giant cat-pimple. It's been drained. She's home again, and a bit grumpy about having had to go to the vets. She'll be around to be grumpy for a long time to come, I hope.

Just thought you'd want to know.

I'm writing a story and enjoying it. It's one of those odd stories that's almost true, in which the narrator is me, or almost, and I don't want to say anything more about it for fear of it going away.

...

The smodcast interview with Kevin Smith was awesome!

What is the title of that new song that Amanda sang? It's very emotional and amazing.

It's called "The Bed Song". Breaks my heart every time.

While enjoying the new anthology STORIES that you co-edited with Al Sarrantonio, I noted with interest that the “Also by Neil Gaiman” page lists your works in two categories: “For Adults” and “For All Ages.” No category “For Children”—the picture book The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish is listed as for all ages. More notable is that both Coraline and The Graveyard Book are listed under “For Adults,” though they are marketed as YA (The Graveyard Book even winning the Newbery Medal for “distinguished contribution to American literature for children”). So, my question: Was this subversion of the usual labels intentional, a sort of thumbing of your nose at artificial and overly-constricting booksellers’ categories?

I would love to say yes, hah! we are wild, but honesty compels me not to. I'm not sure who put the bibliography together, but I didn't see it before Stories came out, so didn't get a chance to correct it.

Hi there Neil! First off, I'm a fan (naturally), and I'd like to be a writer as well. I wanted to write a story about a house and all the people who've lived there, and I've always been inspired by Gothic-style houses. I saw your house on the website this week, and I thought, "Wow! Perfect!" I was wondering if had you any information on when your house was built, or if you designed your house and had someone build it. Basically, I'd love to know more about your home, but I completely understand if you decline to answer, as houses can be private things. Congrats on having such a gorgeous house, by the way! Thanks again for all that you do, your fans appreciate it.
Sincerely,
Jennifer Smith

The House was built somewhere between 1885 and 1900, replacing a house that had burned down (which may well be why this house is brick). It was built by an artist and cartographer (and town clerk, and photographer and I am sure many other things) who came to America from Germany before the Civil War. And it's a wonderful house.

(According to a clipping from the local paper, the house was finished in 1885, but there are photographs of the house before the rear balcony and deck were finished dated 1900.)

The son of the man who built it was moderately famous in his field, and we used to get occasional visitors who wanted to see the house for that reason, although he was born in the house that burned down.

Hi, im from Brazil and me and a lot of ppl want to read American Gods (Deuses americanos in Brasil).
I'm here to ask Gaiman to twitt a message or a tag for ppl give RT and some publishing house publish that for us!

Please, dont ignore that message!
Thank you and sorry for my english.

You aren't the first person in Brazil to grumble about books having gone out of print (or about paying high prices for second-hand copies). I've asked my agent to investigate and to work to get the various books that have been published in Brazil back into print there.

...

Following on from "The Mythological Dimensions of Doctor Who", a call for academic papers for "The Mythological Dimensions of Neil Gaiman" : http://herenistarionnets.blogspot.com/2010/12/call-for-papers-neil-gaiman-collection.html

Jessica and Anthony, who are doing it, say: The volume is intended to be a critical work, but primarily a text written by fans for fans. The first volume in the series, The Mythological Dimensions of Doctor Who set the stage for the general approach & tone.... While we are academics by nature, this series is our attempt to break the so-called 'academic' mold & approach things that we find fascinating. The concept came out of Mythcon 39, which my husband chaired & which the other editor Kristine & I also organized.


...

Dear Mr.Gaiman,

I read in A Conversation with Bill Baker, that as a child you always daydreamed about being a writer. On your website I saw that when you were fifteen you told a career counselor that you wanted to write American comic books. The counselor told you to consider accountancy.

Did you ever have a teacher that thought you were a creative writer and encouraged you to write?

(I love the video of your dogs in the blizzard.)

Stay Warm,
Shayna Sadow
New Jersey

I had a few excellent English teachers -- Bill Hayes at Ardingly, Dick Glynne-Jones and a very smart American teacher, a Mr Wright, at Whitgift, but I don't remember any of them encouraging me to write, although they were often enthusiastic about what I had written.

I loved to write as a boy. But I don't think anyone except me, secretly, thought I was going to grow up to be a writer. (I may be wrong. I should ask Geoff Notkin.)

Dear Neil,

A few days ago, I had to give my first public reading as part of the graduation requirements for Creative Writing Majors at Warren Wilson College in the currently-not-too-snowy mountains of western North Carolina. It was terrifying. I had about ten minutes in front of a crowd of about one hundred students, faculty, friends, and family. As someone who stands up in front of much bigger crowds and reads for much longer periods of time, can you tell me, who hopes to be a well-known writer someday, if it becomes more routine and less terrifying?

Kindest regards,
Hilary B. Bisenieks

Sort of. After you've done it a few times, and they haven't stoned you, or made you leave the stage by throwing bottles at you, it becomes significantly less terrifying. And it can help to think of them as individulas (not scary) as opposed to crowds (scary).

But for me, the terror never really goes away. And I've learned to treasure that, the adrenaline rush before I go on. It keeps me awake, and interested, and helps me think slightly faster, and slows down time just a hair.

And finally, this made me smile:

I just read your December 9th Ask Neil responses about writing and college, and I had to add in my own experience with writing, college, and (of course) Neil Gaiman. Your part in this was pretty small, and you probably don't remember it, but it was oddly monumental for me.

Throughout high school, I was determined not to go to college. My grades were never the best, and I'd seen the stress my friends went through during the application process. Since I was seventeen and therefore knew everything, I was going to graduate and work at a diner or something until I shattered the world with my epic writing. Because, you know, that always works. This was a big source of friction between my mother, who desperately wanted me to continue my education, and myself.

I think it was in 2008 when you were an author at the National Book Festival in Washington, DC--maybe 2009, whichever was the year after Pratchett showed up. The Book Festival's somewhat of a tradition for my family, and when I heard you were going to be talking-- Well, I'm a big fan. Words fail to convey the fangirl spaz-attack of a high-schooler, but I'm sure you're not without experience in that department. It was enough, anyway, that my mother apparently concocted a plan.

We waited in line for hours upon hours, and she snuck in front of me to get a book signed for a friend. In the few precious moments she had before I shoved my way to the front, she apparently asked you to tell me to go to college. I don't know what, exactly, she said, because I didn't hear it. I just heard your response, which was something along the lines of "You want me to tell her to go to college? I'm not going to tell her to go to college. I didn't even go to college, I just wanted to write!"

I then proceeded to loudly and awkwardly declare her burn'd, giggle uncontrollably, and ask you some mundane and probably stupid question about Neverwhere that had been bugging me. Now, two-or-one-or-maybe-three years later, I'm writing this from my dorm room in Coe College, IA, which is rather unfortunate for that temporary victory. Don't get me wrong--I love my school, and I'm actually really happy I didn't take your advice, but I'm glad you gave it. It got her off my case long enough for me to make up my own mind.

Anecdote over, though, Coe's pretty renowned for its writing program. We've got professors from the Iowa Writer's Workshop, they've got lots of pretty degrees, and on a one-on-one sense they're all great people. I've taken one Creative Writing class here, a writer's workshop on fiction. It's been enough to make me drop the major. In the beginning of the class, nearly every writer was submitting fantasy or science fiction. By the end, hardly anyone was submitting anything, and those who did submit were submitting non-genre works. Sure, they were well-written. And I know a few people who've gotten through the program genre-intact. But I can't imagine that this method works for everyone; I know it doesn't work for me.

I guess my point here was to say thanks again for good advice, or at least for posting the advice/questions of others and agreeing. I'm now enrolled as a major in Gender Studies and English, hopefully going to minor in Anthropology if the school gets that squared away, and hoping to continue to law school. None of this has anything to do with writing a novel at all, technically, but it's helped my writing so much more than the classes ever did.

Labels: important questions of the day, Princess, this actually is my beautiful house

Cats in the Sauna and Boiling Water Tricks

The dogs are enjoying the cold. (Except for last night, when the thermometer in the kitchen that measures the temperature outside dropped as far as minus 20.6F, which is minus 29C, before announcing that it had taken itself offline.)

I tried the magic boiling water trick late last night: boil a kettle, pour the water into a cup, walk outside at minus 20F and throw the boiling water into the air, where it turns instantly to powdery snowy dust. I did it. It worked. I'd pressed the wrong button on the phone and had failed to record it for posterity. I decided I wasn't going to do it again, because there are lots of people doing it on YouTube already (and even some respected institutions). Nor was I going to sit outside in the cold looking at meteors. Instead I went back down to the bottom of the garden and wrote.)

The weird thing is that, once we get into the depths of winter, -20 will be a temperature I look forward to. It's -40 I don't like. (And once we get to -40, which is the same in F or C, I do not care about things like windchill.)

I read once that at minus 70 F, there is a gentle tinkling noise that your breath makes as it freezes and falls to the ground, but I am happy not to put this to the test.

Anyway...

The Dogs are enjoying the weather.

The Cats are not. The cats have more or less taken up residence in the sauna...

There used to be seven cats in this house. There were always seven cats. As one died off or went walkabout, never to return, another would turn up at the back door. But two large white dogs sort of put an end to that, alas. So as the older cats have died off, the house cat numbers have diminished.

Coconut, who was once Maddy's kitten, is the youngest. He's a very amiable, easygoing sort of a cat.

And then there's Princess, who is not amiable, and is only easygoing in the sense that the mad old lady who lives down the road and glares at you when you walk past her house is easygoing if you don't disturb her. Princess is the oldest cat we have. She arrived here on June the 26th 1994, Holly's 9th birthday, but I'd glimpsed her at a distance, a feral ghost living wild in the woods for a good year before that. She's feisty and grumpy and likes making people do their trick for her, which is turning on the tap so a trickle of water comes out, and then waiting while she drinks a little.

She glares at you if you turn the tap off before she's done.

She also likes making visitors pet her. In the old days she would let you know she was done with being stroked by viciously sinking her teeth into you, deep and hard, but she's too old for that nonsense now. I used to have to muzzle her before I could trim her nails or remove knotted balls of fur. Now she'll submit to anything. Beneath the fur she weighs nothing at all...

And I just discovered that she has a lump on her left cheek. I'll get her to the vet... I hope it's not something big and bad. I've grown so used to having a bad-tempered but beautiful cat that I need to warn visitors about. She's outlasted all the cats I loved and all the cats I bonded with.

And I think she's grown very used to me.

When Zoe died, it was really easy to explain to people how much you could miss a sweet, gentle cat who was nothing but a ball of utter love. I'm going to have a much harder time one day, months or even years from now, explaining why I miss the meanest, grumpiest and most dangerous cat I've ever encountered.

Sigh.

...

Back to work. Let me point you at this eBay auction for the CBLDF.

You can buy Frank Miller's drawing chair, the one he did Dark Knight and Sin City and 300 at (careful! if you buy it you may find yourself with drawing abilities you did not previously possess, but you may also start covering your face with bandaids after being beaten up by problematic dames and crooked cops, and the next thing you know you'll be coming out of retirement and fighting crime grittily in a wrinkled costume*).

Or buy someone the final copies of the Tony Harris illustrated "In Reilig Oran", a poem I wrote that we did a limited edition of earlier this year for the Chicago Comic Con. It's signed by me and Tony. (These are BUY NOW, so you can buy one and still get it in time for Xmas. Hurrah.)

And if you're wondering why to support the CBLDF or take out a membership... well, they are currently actively fighting things like this. (I know. It's very vague. At the point where things move on a bit it will be less vague and announcements will be made..)

*This statement is not approved by the CBLDF. Or the FDA. Or anybody who approves statements.

Labels: Cats, Princess, strange things you can do in the winter, The Valley of the Shadow of Death of Cats

Does Anyone Else have Something Further To Add?

Good morning. I cannot stay long as deadlines are happening.

Cat Mihos, in association with the CBLDF, has made the most beautiful print of Jim Lee's glorious pencil-art to accompany my poem "100 Words". It'll be limited to 750 numbered prints, and is lettered by Todd Klein. (Click on it in order to actually see it at readable size.) She decided that the first 24 hours it was on sale at her neverwear.net site, it would be $35, going up to $45 the following day. I linked to it on Twitter and... crashed the site. (Or possibly, crashed the shopping cart. I'm not sure. Different reports from people who couldn't get in.)

So Cat is extending the sale (at http://www.neverwear.net/store/) until the end of Monday, when she gets home from her trip out here, to apologise to people who had problems, and to allow people to get to it. You can read all about it (and see lots of Cat's candid snaps, including one of me in a 20 foot long Tom Baker style Doctor Who scarf I was sent by a reader who knits and likes Doctor Who and thought I needed one) over at http://kittysneverwear.blogspot.com

And on the subject of photos, KImberly Butler is out at the house right now to shoot photos of me, with her daughter Caitlin as a camera assistant. She is a remarkable photographer (http://www.kimberlybutler.com is her website). She's here because I am the Honorary Chair of National Library Week next year (details at this ALA website).

She's taking pictures of me to find one that could be used as a poster for National Library Week, and for press releases. Here are a few of the photos from yesterday, raw from her camera. I put up a selection at http://twitpic.com/photos/neilhimself. Here are four of my favourites. One of them is not of me.

(Strangest twitter comment this morning was from the person who told me off for surgically trimming my dog's ears. Someone who, I assume, has never encountered a German Shepherd or has any idea what their ears do. His ears are fine -- he just sticks them up when he's interested or listening. )



During the shoot Lorraine brought me tea. I got happy. Kimberly kept shooting.



Princess the cat and deformed bunnies (and a two-headed teddy). Probably will not be a National Library Week poster. (Click to see it full-size.)

Does anyone else have something further to add?

I go. Maddy's violin recital, a short story and an introduction are waiting. Zoom.

Labels: Four Photos, Jim Lee, Kimberly Butler, Princess, R. A. Lafferty, Todd Klein, zoom

Black on Black

All the CBLDF black tee shirts are signed ( about a hundred, plus another dozen or so in order that Lorraine has something to send to charity auctions when I'm on the road).

How does one tell "the first black tee shirt I ever owned" apart from a hundred other black tee shirts?

It's an odd tee shirt, not very pretty, with a square and a pattern on it, bought in Brighton walking from the train station to the Metropole hotel in 1987. It's actually a misprint. I bought it because it was a little odd, and very cheap, and I felt sorry for it, little knowing that I was soon going to have to start writing comics to fund my newfound black tee shirt addiction.

Hello Mr. Gaiman--

Where did you get your Disaster Area T-shirt? How might one obtain one of these shirts after the one you have signed is immediately bought by someone with class and taste who is not me, as I will not be near San Diego? Google is not helpful, as the shirts available are not black-on-black.

Actually, my one is one of the very few black tee shirts I kept. (I kept back a handful of beloved ones and ones that had obviously never been worn.) (And will still have Too Many Black Tee Shirts when all this is over.)

I don't remember where I bought it, alas, or where I got it (a science fiction book shop or a convention at a guess, or might have been a gift from a friend or from ZZ9Plural Z Alpha, an organisation of which I have the honour to be a life member, or...). Probably someone reading this will go "You don't remember where you were when you got your black on black Disaster Area Sundive Tour tee shirt? How can you have forgotten?" and tell me.

I saw that the National Book Festival was added to "Where's Neil." Any chance you'll be checking out SPX the following weekend or maybe doing a reading at "Politics and Prose" like you've done in the past? I mean you got a new book coming out, sounds like a great excuse for a reading. PLEASE do a reading!!! You're one of the few authors who's reading voice is just as hypnotizing as their writing voice.

That's very kind of you. The Book Festival will be what I'll do in Washington this year, and there will be a reading in the tent for The Graveyard Book. There will also be a signing.

Tuesday the 30th of September I'll be doing an event in New York.

Weds Oct 1st, I'll be in Philadelphia.

Thurs Oct 2nd, Chicago

Friday Oct 3rd, Seattle

Saturday Oct 4th, San Francisco

(Sunday is an Oakland event just for booksellers)

Monday Oct 6th Los Angeles

Tuesday Oct 7th, Boulder, Colorado

Weds Oct 8th, Minneapolis.

I don't yet know where the events will be (proabably theatres or churches. Probably not graveyards). I do know that I'll be reading a whole story from The Graveyard Book at each stop (except for Chapter 7, which I'll split between LA and Boulder), and the current plan is to webcast each event, which will be long -- lots of reading, Q&A, all that, like the CBLDF Guardian Angel tour "Evening With Neil Gaiman" events we used to do. But while there will be piles of freshly-signed books for sale at each event, I probably won't be doing a signing per se.

We're basing each event on the ones I did for the much-missed Cody's in 2003 and 2006 (you can watch the 2006 event here).

Hi Neil,

"The Price" is one of my all time favorite stories. In fact, I always think of my black Morpheus as the house protector because of it. You've mentioned a cat update, though I haven't seen any update on your very interesting cats. What's going on with them? Have you added any new members to your clowder?

I keep meaning to do a cat update.

This is Princess. You can see a photo of her eleven years ago in the back of the Charles Vess illustrated Stardust. She's called Snowflake in "The Price". We think she's about sixteen -- she turned up on Holly's ninth birthday, but we'd seen her in the woods for almost a year before that. She's a blue-eyed white cat and is not deaf, although her two white blue-eyed kittens were. She was feral before she came to us, and is still never to be taken for granted.


She will follow -- or lead -- anyone into the family bathroom upstairs, where they are expected to turn on the tap for her to drink, and wait while she drinks, then turn the tap off.


Also, she can read the Fortean Times with her bottom.

Labels: Graveyard Book tour, Princess, tee shirts

New Year's Day

The rain turned to snow before midnight, and I was already asleep by then, feeling sort of under the weather. This morning the sky was a perfect blue and, feeling a bit less like I was getting 'flu than I had the night before, I headed out for a walk in the woods.

The best thing about going for walks in the woods are the cats, who pretend they aren't really along for the walk, but are merely there by some kind of feline coincidence. Today the cat pretending she wasn't actually accompanying me was Princess, who was extremely well camouflaged. We startled a rabbit hiding in a fallen screech-owl box, who waited until we were inches away to thump off at speed.

I don't think I've made New Year's Resolutions for a while, but I think it's time to lose some weight, get back into shape and start to think about the next adult novel while getting a lot more written on the next children's novel. Meanwhile, lots of small deadlines to get done.

I'm not sure how long this article from the Economist will stay up online, but reading it left me wishing I hadn't already written a djinn story, in American Gods, and starting to wonder if there wasn't something else I wanted to say.

All this may yet play a part in the war on terrorism. Factions in Somalia and Afghanistan have accused their enemies of being backed not only by the CIA but by malevolent jinn. One theory in Afghanistan holds that the mujahideen, “two-legged wolves”, scared the jinn out into the world, causing disharmony. It is jinn, they say, who whisper into the ears of suicide-bombers.

...The story of Ahmed Shah Masoud, the commander of Afghanistan's Northern Alliance, clearly shows up the link between jinn and myth-making. Masoud resisted the Soviet Union and the Taliban from his base in the Panjshir valley until he was assassinated by al-Qaeda operatives on September 9th 2001. According to local legend, Muslim jinn were on his side. One of his fighters was said to have slain a dragon in a mountain lake during the Soviet occupation and to have brought the dragon's jewel to Masoud, with the help of Muslim jinn. In murdering Masoud, some Panjshiris say, Osama bin Laden declared war on Muslim jinn also.

http://www.economist.com/world/displaystory.cfm?story_id=8401289

Labels: djinn, photos, Princess, Winter