A giant TOUR catch up. Also, we wear the same boots.

I need to get back to blogging. Too many things are stacking up, and I'm paying attention over on Twitter and Tumblr and such, but not here, and really, this is still the most important place to check.

Today I was interviewed by Lev Grossman (author of The Magicians) for Time Magazine about Ocean at the End of the Lane. Lev and I have been having a conversation about fantasy since he interviewed me about Stardust in 1998. (Although one time the conversation was a threesome with Joss Whedon.) Lev does not appear to have perceptibly aged in 15 years. I find this suspicious. Also, we were wearing the same boots.

So, let's see.

This comes out tomorrow, designed and made beautiful by Chip Kidd:

Make Good Art (Amazon link. Indiebound link.) It's the anniversary of the original speech:

Neil Gaiman Addresses the University of the Arts Class of 2012 from The University of the Arts (Phl) on Vimeo.

I finished signing about 9000 sheets of paper, which will be sent to the printers and bound into 9000 copies of THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE.  They look like this. (When I got bored I drew ghosts.)

If you are in the US you can pre-order them from PORTER SQUARE BOOKS:  http://www.portersquarebooks.com/pre-order-signed-copy-ocean-end-lane. If you preorder by May 20th you can get your book by publication day, June 18th. (If you preorder afterwards, they will still have signed copies, but you will probably not get yours by publication date.)

When I was in Austin in March I recorded the Audiobook of The Ocean at the End of the Lane. It's just been reviewed at Audiophile magazine: http://www.audiofilemagazine.com/dbsearch/showreview.cfm?Num=77510

"How long have you been 11 for?" That's just one of the mysteries in THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE, where otherworldly things might be strange but aren't in the least impossible. As the 7-year-old protagonist, Neil Gaiman projects all the wonders and terrors of childhood, both ordinary and extraordinary. His neighbors, 11-year-old Lettie, Mrs. Hempstock, and Old Mrs. Hempstock, have rural Sussex accents that get stronger when the things that they love and protect are threatened. Gaiman evokes the comforts of their farm lovingly--good food, a full moon that always shines on the back of the house just so--and they contrast with the coldly emotionless voice of the story's villain. Spooky, beautiful, and magical, OCEAN will stay with listeners for a long time. J.M.D. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award 

...which makes me very happy indeed. I'm more nervous about the audiobooks than I am about anything else.


....TOUR NEWS....

Right. We have a lot of sold-out tour dates. We have some that aren't yet sold out, and if you want to come and hear me talk and ask questions and get a book signed you might want to get your tickets very soon.

NOT SOLD OUT YET: The Publication Day event is June 18th. It's in Brooklyn, at the Howard Gilman Music Hall. This should be really fun and special. Surprise guests, publication day madness, and the special jet lag of an author who did his last event the night before in the UK and got off the plane earlier that afternoon.

http://www.bam.org/literary/2013/neil-gaiman

Wednesday June 19th NYC - SOLD OUT. I THINK.

Thursday June 20th - Saratoga Springs: NOT SOLD OUT YET (it's a big venue). The pre-signing interview will also be broadcast on NPR. http://www.northshire.com/event/shelf-authors-conversation-neil-gaiman-presenting-ocean-end-lane

Friday June 21st, Washington DC. ALMOST SOLD OUT - a hundred or so seats left.  http://www.politics-prose.com/event/book/neil-gaiman-ocean-end-of-lane

Saturday June 22nd Decatur GA. SOLD OUT.

Sunday June 23rd Coral Gables (near Miami). It's an afternoon signing - starts at 2 pm. I think it may be my first ever signing in a shul. NOT SOLD OUT YET. http://www.booksandbooks.com/event/neil-gaiman-ocean-end-lane-temple-judea

Monday June 24th Dallas TX. ONLY BALCONY SEATS LEFT. It's at the Dallas Museum of Art. I like the idea of bringing OCEAN home: I finished it and typed the first draft in a Dallas coffee shop.  http://dallasmuseumofart.org/Events/ArtsLettersLive/Special/index.htm

Tuesday June 25th Denver, Tattered Cover. This is one of three stores whose tickets do not go onsale until publication day.

Wednesday June 26th Phoenix Az.  ALMOST SOLD OUT. http://www.changinghands.com/neilgaiman

Thursday June 27th. LOS ANGELES. I'll be talking with EW's Geoff Boucher. NOT YET SOLD OUT but selling fast and you may want to get in there, http://livetalksla.org/blog/2013/04/02/june-27-an-evening-with-neil-gaiman/

FRIDAY JUNE 28th SAN FRANCISCO is SOLD OUT

SAT JUNE 29 PORTLAND is SOLD OUT

(Then I teach Clarion West for a week in Seattle, interrupted only by...)

TUESDAY JULY 2 SEATTLE which is SOLD OUT

SATURDAY JULY 6 SANTA ROSA isn't yet sold out.  If you're in the Bay Area and you are not happy about how fast San Francisco sold out, you should come to Santa Rosa. http://www.copperfieldsbooks.com/event/neil-gaiman

Also at my request, the event start time has moved earlier in the evening, to 6:30pm as I was worried about how late it would go if it started at 8. (Sorry.)

and then I fly across the country like a speeding teatray and the next time I touch solid ground it's

Sunday July 7th and I'm in Ann Arbor, Mi.  It starts at 6pm. it is NOT SOLD OUT -- info at http://www.nicolasbooks.com/event/one-time-only-event-nicolas-books-brings-neil-gaiman-michigan-theater-ocean-end-lane-tour. (And if you are in the Chicago area and sad about the selling out of Chicago, you could hit the road and come and see me there.)

Monday, July 8th, Edina MN. This is the Twin Cities stop, and I am hoping to see lots of the home crowd. Tickets/wristbands etc do not go on sale until publication date, June 18th. http://store-locator.barnesandnoble.com/event/79661 is the B&N website, but it doesn't have much information -- there's more on everything at http://www.neilgaiman.com/where/details.php?id=149

Tuesday July 9th Chicago - this is SOLD OUT I'm afraid.

Wednesday July 10th Nashville TN -- this one is selling well, but it isn't sold out yet. http://www.wmarocks.com/events/detail/neil-gaiman-war-memorial?perf-no=4009

Thursday July 11th Lexington KY  -- It's at Joseph Beth (a wonderful bookshop). Not sure how close to sold out they are -- Tickets are "Purchase at Joseph-Beth Lexington or via 859-273-2911"

And then I get my first day off! I fly back to Cambridge,  I sleep in my own bed for the first time in over a month, and then...

Saturday 13th July I do the last signing of the tour. It's sponsored by Porter Square Books (who are selling the pre-signed books as well) and tickets are going on sale on publication day, June 18th, and can only be picked up locally. Information at http://www.neilgaiman.com/where/details.php?id=153


Then there will be three Canadian signings, which have not yet been announced.

And of the UK events coming up in August, the only one that's been announced is:

Tuesday 20th of August, when I'll be in Ely Cathedral. And I think that one is going to be fun....  http://www.toppingbooks.co.uk/events/ely/neil-gaiman-2/

Labels: make good art, Selling out but in a good way, The Last Signing Tour, The Ocean At The End of the Lane, The same boots

Amazing Book Cover Announcements and throwing up in anniversary gutters

My publisher, William Morrow, have just released the cover for my first adult novel in about 7 years, The Ocean at the End of the Lane. It comes out in June. It looks like this:

This is how the publisher describes it:

The Ocean at the End of the Lane is a fable that reshapes modern fantasy: moving, terrifying and elegiac—as pure as a dream, as delicate as a butterfly’s wing, as dangerous as a knife in the dark. It began for our narrator forty years ago when the family's lodger stole their car and committed suicide in it, stirring up ancient powers best left undisturbed. Dark creatures from beyond the world are on the loose, and it will take everything our narrator has just to stay alive: there is primal horror here, and menace unleashed—within his family and from the forces that have gathered to destroy it. His only defense is three women, on a farm at the end of the lane. The youngest of them claims that her duck pond is an ocean. The oldest can remember the Big Bang.

And they've announced the existence of the beautiful Chip Kidd-designed Make Good Art speech book, which will be out in May. (An actual "by popular demand" book, because lots of other publishers came to my agent and asked if they could make my speech last year at UArts into a book, in time for Graduation Time this year. And we went to my normal publisher and suggested they do it, and they agreed.)

Neil Gaiman Addresses the University of the Arts Class of 2012 from The University of the Arts (Phl) on Vimeo.

Chip is probably the finest book designer in the world. And in this book he breaks all the rules of design and makes something amazing in its own right.

Amazon run the biography of from Chu's Day on the Make Good Art Amazon page, which will undoubtedly confuse some people.

Morrow have also released The Ocean at the End of the Lane desktop wallpaper in, so far, six version, so you will not forget that it is coming out:

• iPad (Download)

• 2560x1440 (Download)

• 1920x1080 (Download)

• 1024x768 (Download)

• 800x600 (Download)

• 640x480 (Download)

And…

• A 3-D image of The Ocean at the End of the Lane (Download)

• A 3-D image of Make Good Art (Download)

They look like this:

...

I sang the Fireball Xl5 theme, as you probably know if you've been reading this blog.

Here's the footage of that, and my new year's wish:

In other news, my second wedding anniversary last night was fun, except for the food poisoning, which meant that Amanda and I threw up in gutters a lot, and I spent this morning in the ER watching her get a saline drip. We went out for such a fancy anniversary dinner, and it was the most expensive food we've ever thrown up. Next year I think we'll just go somewhere we like.

(I read Michael Fry's The Odd Squad in the ER, because that was what I had with me. Perfect ER reading while the person down the hall is screaming and the homeless man in the wheelchair has begun to grunt, loudly and incoherently, and your wife is sleeping on a drip beneath the beautiful black Kambriel greatcoat, which seems to have found its person. Funny and sweet with a steely centre.)

I'm now on my way to Minneapolis from New York, to see my daughters and my dogs, and to take part in the pilot for a new NPR radio show.

...

REMINDER: Sydney Australia. Melbourne's sold out, but there are still tickets to come and see me in Sydney on January the 25th. It will be a long, fun evening. There may well be some music. (And if anyone from Salt & Poppet is out there, and if you still have the Australia Day Poem puppets from Melbourne and want to repeat it in Sydney, let me know.)

Tickets are onsale at http://hosted.verticalresponse.com/370024/cbf6892451/1575524295/4dd7bdf0bc/

Labels: fireball xl5, make good art, The Ocean At The End of the Lane, unconditional love

Graduation, and further commencement fall-out...

Today, Maddy, my youngest daughter, graduated from High School. I was asked if I'd like to deliver the address, but declined. I wanted to be a dad, and sit in the audience with my family and beam proudly, and wander around taking photographs afterwards of Maddy and all her friends. And that's what I did. It was great.

When I started this blog, she was six. 

I love you Maddy Gaiman, and am so proud of you.

Soon there will be nothing keeping me in the midwest except inertia, and this is where my stuff is. And my bees. I'm hoping to spend more time on the West Coast with my two older children, and much much much more time on the East Coast with my wife, when she finishes her 2013 world tour, at any rate.

In the meantime, I'm reposting this cartoon.  You'll need to click on it to read it at its home page, as the way Blogger software is set up these days does not agree with it, and I can't get it readable here. It's from http://zenpencils.com/comic/50-neil-gaiman-make-good-art/  It's by Gavin Aung Than, and I hope I get to thank him personally for doing it the next time I'm in Melbourne. He's taken a bit from the middle of my UArts commencement speech and made it into a comic.

The speech has been, I was bewildered to learn, viewed over 335,000 times on Vimeo, and is now captioned in English, Czech, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Korean, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish at http://www.universalsubtitles.org/en/videos/IOH3jJ6INIof/info/neil-gaiman-addresses-the-university-of-the-arts-class-of-2012/ . It's still in its original vanilla form at http://vimeo.com/42372767. And it's even crept onto YouTube -- which may be useful for people in countries that have blocked Vimeo.

Labels: Maddy, Maddy Graduates, make good art

Trust me, I'm a Doctor * (*Honorary, of Fine Arts)

This needs a proper blog entry all of its own, but I am running around like a mad thing, so as a stopgap, here's the Commencement Address I gave yesterday to the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. Everything I could think of that someone starting out on a career in the arts right now might need to know.

Labels: art, commencement address, make good art, speech