The Dog Ate My Homework.

Actually my homework is pretty much all that the dog* hasn't eaten. Shoelaces and shoes are her favourites. The blog was swallowed by a failed attempt to blog from my phone (I wrote a great long blog on the phone today on a blogging app while at the dentist's, and then tried to attach a picture, did it wrong and sent the blog off into the netherworld instead. Probably my own fault for talking about the second book in the American Gods sequence.)

But I'm still doing the giant American Gods Tenth Anniversary Edition proofread and copy-edit. (It'll be out in June.)

I'm going to finish that before I reconstruct the blog entry. So, for your enjoyment and curiousity, I'm reposting the Prisoners of Gravity episode on Sandman from 1993...

If you've ever wondered what Charles Vess or Jill Thompson or Craig Russell or Karen Berger or Dave Mckean looked like 17 years ago (or longer -- Mark Askwith was collecting the interviews for a while), or what baby Neil was like, now's your chance.








PS: Oh, okay. That's not really baby Neil. I was probably 32.

This is Baby Neil.

PPS: the CBLDF has a bunch of original artwork and suchlike up for auction on eBay. Great holiday gifts for other people, or yourself.




* Lola. Cabal does not eat anything he is not meant to. Sometimes he doesn't eat things he is actually meant to eat either.

Labels: American Gods, photo of me holding something, Prisoners of Gravity

Xmas Roundup With Some Good Links and a photo of an author in it

How the hell did it get to be December the 18th? Ohhh. All the links I meant to post. Arghh.

For a start, I want to repost this little true thing I wrote, from last year's Independent: it's about being an eight year old Jewish kid who really wanted a Christmas tree...

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/features/neil-gaiman-hanukkah-with-bells-on-1203307.html

I wanted to tell you that you can still get the signed prints of "Before You Read This" I did with Todd Klein -- it's a poem I wrote that Todd lettered -- at Todd's website (along with Todd's other unique signed prints -- collaborations with Alex Ross, Alan Moore and J.H. Williams). http://kleinletters.com/Blog/?p=6525. (If you're hesitating, order: they're really cheap, and the second printing will be gone soon.)

Also, for signed things and rare stuff, you can Do Good while last minute shopping by heading over to the CBLDF shop website. Here's the page with stuff related to me on it.)

I just got my author's copies of "A Hundred Words To Talk of Death", the poem I wrote that Jim Lee illustrated and Todd Klein lettered. (Someone wrote to me on Twitter pointing out that it is two syllables short, and unable to figure out why. I will leave that as a problem for you to solve.) It's beautiful -- the same size and quality as the print of "The Day The Saucers Came". It's glorious. (Thinks: I can take a photo to show people.)

I didn't used to think of Jim Lee as a glorious and subtle pencil artist, but he really is, and this is wonderful. (You can order them from here, and read about Kitty's adventures in shipping them out over at http://kittysneverwear.blogspot.com/, with bonus pictures right now of my Very Late Guy Fawkes Part of last month.)

Here is a photo of an author who needs a shave holding a print of "One Hundred Words" poem.

Kitty herself is heading off on tour with Lady Gaga early next year, and Maddy is going to see them in Chicago (where, about eight years ago, I first met Kitty, on the road with Tori) (Who will be interviewed tonight on ABC -- Tori that is, not Kitty or Maddy).

Amanda and I have been having something that isn't quite an argument about Lady Gaga for a few weeks. We have really rubbish arguments, because they normally resolve into the discovery that we weren't arguing at all, just saying the same thing from two different points of view. Amanda posted a ukulele video-song-blog she'd written late last night from her Boston flat when she was probably meant to be practising her New Year's Eve Tchaikovsky, and I discovered that our latest argument wasn't an argument and we were talking about the same things again. It's art. You make it.

I don't think I will ever write songs and post them on YouTube instead of blogging. I'm in awe of someone who can. It's a good song, too, not just a funny and wise end-of-an-argument, even if she has to stop and scroll down at the last verse.




Also, she said "aluminium".

And finally, in keeping with the not-exactly-Christmassy-but-sort-of theme of this blog...

Labels: amanda palmer, Jewish Christmas things, Jim Lee, lady gaga, photo of me holding something, Tim Minchin, Todd Klein