Not cute

Today I had, emergencies, houseguests, strawberries and a yellow fever vaccination, more or less in that order. (For the concerned, the baby raccoons were gone by yesterday afternoon, and I think it's a good bet that they went off with their mum. Today's cuteness quotient was filled by The Chipmunk In The Drainpipe, but I didn't take photos.)


Hey, Neil!

You're coming to Rio de Janeiro for an event in July, yeah? Is there any chance you'll do signings anywhere other than Paraty? Tickets for your lecture sold out a couple hours after they became available; you have a bazillion fans here!

I don't think so; I was asked if I'd like to do a small, invitation-only event for perhaps a hundred people in Sao Paulo after the Flip Paraty festival, and I said no -- mostly because an event for a hundred people seemed like a good way to upset a few thousand people who wouldn't be able to be there (given what happened last time I signed in Brazil -- http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2001/05/american-gods-blog-post-57.html). I said I'd love to do a big enough event that many people would be made happy, but I don't think anyone wanted to do that. So unless something changes in the next two weeks -- and I promise I'll post it here if it does -- no, it'll just be the FLIP event. (And the Desert Island Books event -- I'm reading at that as well).

And a few people have written to ask about signings at FLIP and whether I'll be signing and suchlike, and the truth is I have no idea -- I'll find out and post here what I find.

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I've been a fan and supporter of the Guys Read website and project, which encourages young male humans to read books. I was pleased when I recently discovered that the UK has its own project - Boys into Books, which despite sounding like a ghastly attempt to transform our surplus young into reading matter, is a very sensible thing: http://www.sla.org.uk/boys-into-books-overview.php

They have a list of recommended books for boys at http://www.sla.org.uk/boys-into-books-11-14.pdf and tell us that:

From mid May until mid September 2007, state schools in England having at least 20 boys of this age group were able to order 20 titles from the list, which were delivered, ready jacketed, free of charge, and also two sets of three Boys into Books posters and 450 postcards.

Which is the kind of thing that I wish would spread beyond the UK, and which should be revived every few years in the UK. So I thought I'd mention that here.

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With the help of the webgoblin, I recently upgraded my Panasonic W7 from Windows Vista to Windows XP, and it now runs like a dream. It's nice not to have to wait for words to appear once more.

Let's see... The Rogue Artists Ensemble have reworked their Mr Punch performance and will be bringing it back on the stage -- hope I can catch it this time. Lots of information up at http://broadwayworld.com/viewcolumn.cfm?colid=29261 -- although I suspect their previews are in July and not, as posted, in April.

Today I did the proofread on the back matter of Absolute Sandman Volume 4 (which will be out in November). The script in Absolute Sandman Volume 3 is for Sandman 50, which is (in my opinion) the least interesting Sandman script -- although Craig Russell's amazing pencils make up for it a bit. So to make up for it in Absolute Sandman Volume 4 we have the first script for The Kindly Ones and the last script of all, the one for Sandman 75, along with lots of pencils and breakdowns. (You can see a lot of the original pencils for the work that Bryan Talbot and John Ridgway did on Sandman 75, to Charles Vess' breakdowns.)

And I got a call from Vertigo editor-queen Karen Berger asking how I'd feel about another volume of Absolute Sandman, one with Endless Nights and Dream Hunters, and perhaps the Sandman Midnight Theatre story, and the story at the beginning of Dust Covers in it.... I'm not sure. I like that Sandman is one four volume book. Having said that, lots of you have written and asked about it, and Endless Nights and Mr Amano's lovely Dream Hunters are both out of print as hardbacks, and it would be nice to see that art that huge. I suppose I'd feel fine about it if we called it something other than Absolute Sandman Volume 5. Absolute Sandman Supplemental maybe?

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And for all the people doing the SFX hundred favourite authors meme, it's Samuel R Delany, not Delaney. Just saying...

And I tried to find the SFX list on the SFX site, and couldn't. But I found a terrific little Q&A with Paul Cornell on writing short stories at http://www.sfx.co.uk/page/sfx?entry=author_interview_paul_cornell

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Oops. Nearly forgot -- over at the Subterranean Press website, you can win a UK Advanced Reading Copy of The Graveyard Book: http://www.thegraveyardbook.com/2008/06/win-an-advance-reading-copy-of-the-uk-edition-of-the-graveyard-book/

You write your own epitaph to win. And from the ones people have posted, I am extremely glad I am not judging.

Labels: absolute Sandman, Brazil, chipmunk in my drainpipe, guys read, you have no idea how much I hate the combination of this computer and windows Vista

Leaving Downunder

Dinner last night with Margo Lanagan arranged by Allen and Unwin, where she reassured me about Clarion and told me about her new novel (I am excited) and we talked about words and about Australia and about a story I mean to write this year. Then back to the hotel and had a three hour phone call to Bloomsbury in London, calling in the copy-edits on The Graveyard Book. My copy editor was very patient with me, despite the oddness of The Graveyard Book meaning that sometimes things would be a bit counter-intuitive: I had to explain to her how a ten year old (dead) boy could have a twenty year old (dead) grandmother. But most of her queries were wise and smart and (this is important) will make me look good.

A flood of letters from Australians who inform me that I was having my leg pulled over the hamburger thing -- and if you read what I posted and imagine the chef as a dry-humoured assie bloke, that's just how it reads. For example:

> (Unconvinced Five Star Hotel Night Chef.) "If you say so, sir. It's just people here complain if their hamburgers aren't made of ham.


Major possibilities:

a) chef was sadistic or insane

b) chef had quirky sense of humour

c) balance of your mind disturbed by excessive book signing

d) you were unwitting participant in 'candid camera' equivalent

e) you had accidentally wandered into a neighbouring universe

f) other
In Australia, hamburger means ground up cow. Always.

Saw your talk at the State Library in Melbourne btw - very enjoyable, and The Graveyard Book sounds like it's going to be a good one.

cheers,

Steve

I'd go for f). Honestly, she sounded very young, very defensive and, I'm afraid, a bit upset, like someone who had actually been told off a few weeks ago by a hotel guest for the lack of ham in his hamburger and had been determined not to make that mistake again, and now here was a smartarse pom late at night telling her she'd been right all along. And I felt a bit sorry for her.

(This was at the Four Seasons Sydney in George Street -- a nice enough hotel, although the rooms are tiny, but also the first Four Seasons I've stayed in that felt more or less like a Mariott - as if they'd bought someone else's hotel and put a Four Seasons logo on, but not really changed anything else.)

I'm off to the US today, via Narita airport. A few people kindly wrote and offered to show me around during my 9 hour layover, and I was going to take at least one person up on it, but I now strongly suspect that instead of doing anything at all I'll get a local hotel room and try and sleep -- horizontally, rather than sitting down -- between two ten hour flights.

Let me point you at this Boing Boing Entry and this Locus Article, in which Cory Doctorow talks about dandelion and mammalian reproductive strategies and how these things relate to selling things or giving them away on the web -- some of this came out of a wonderful conversation last Christmas between Cory and Rob Brydon and me, which Cory and I carried on the next time we saw each other, at Eastercon. (The ideas are all Cory's. All I did was say, "What exactly do you mean by that?" and "But for Heaven's sake, Cory, what about...?" a lot.)

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Hi Neil,

Quick question about The Graveyard Book - do you have plans to release signed copies in cardboard dumps as you did with American Gods and Anansi Boys?

I offered, but that's no longer possible for some logistical reason I never quite understood.

Neil,

I'd just like to thank you for your appearance at Books Kinokuniya in Sydney on the 6th. It was a great night, and truly inspiring to see that despite the 500-odd people eagerly queued, you still had time for each one of us.


Thank you also for posing for a photo with a sign expressly prohibiting personal photos (which can be quite shamelessly found at my blog; http://chasinggeese.blogspot.com/2008/05/please-note-awesome.html). It made my night.

Now that's all taken care of I'd like to ask if your short story 'Orange' is in print anywhere, as I've only seen it as a video of a live reading (or memorably first hand, when you were in Sydney in 2006).
Kind Regards,

Luke


Why thank you. "Orange" is in The Starry Rift. You can learn more about it at http://thestarryrift.com/

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Michael Zulli sent me http://englishrussia.com/?p=1808#more-1808 -- beautiful pictures of fairy tale abandoned Russian wooden houses.

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Despite following instructions on stripping this computer with Windows Vista down to its work and memory undies, it's still like working with a computer in 1986, in terms of slowness and pauses and delay. Dynamism.com helpfully sent me Windows XP to do a downgrade on it, which I'll do when I get home... I still love the computer, though: it weighs about half of a Mac airbook, and has a DVD drive to boot. But I can't simply type and keep typing - it suddenly stops to inspect itself for fleas or something and loses anything I typed while it was thinking, or squashes words together, or I find myself randomly typing somewhere else in the paragraph... argh.

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And before I forget, a big, big thank you to everyone at Allen and Unwin, especially Sarah Tran, to all the booksellers (Ellison Hawker, Dymocks in Melbourne and Sydney, and Kinokuniya (who gave me the new edition of A Humument as a thank you for signing there, which made me unspeakably happy), and to the staff and organisers of the CBCA, the Melbourne State Library folk, to various old friends who waved or helped (you know who you are) and all the people who showed up at the signings and made it so pleasant...

And yes, in 1998, I brought the "stick" home with me.

Labels: australia, hamburger, Margo Lanagan, sydney, you have no idea how much I hate the combination of this computer and windows Vista