Yep, we're on :D

Supernatural, SGU, Sanctuary, all starting at 8

Food, folks, and fun

Casa Cthulhu

Come one, come all.

http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/11/very-sekrit-passphrase.html

There were 38 independent bookshops around the land who had Graveyard Book parties. The people at Harpers somehow got it down to 11, and they sent them to me to judge the winner. The winner gets me for a signing in December. I watched the 11 videos/descriptions/ photos. I watched them again. I watched them yet again, this time with Lorraine, my assistant, watching too and saying helpful things like, "They are all so good. Whoo. Don't know how you'll make a decision. Look at that! They're line dancing to Monster Mash! And that Death is on stilts, isn't he. Is that a horse? A horse in a store? These are amazing." The fourth time, Woodsman Hans wandered in from the deep woods (where he is making a pond) and watched them too.Here is Doug Jones and some strange man it said.
Hi Neil,

I am a long-time fan, and have even met you backstage at a Tori show (though that was many years ago!). I am writing to ask a bit of a favor.

About 10 years ago, I appeared on 20/20 with Tori, speaking about sexual violence. Since then, I've stayed close with Tori whose been a mentor of the best kind. I also started a nonprofit, Pandora's Project, that provides support, information, and resources to rape and sexual abuse survivors and their supporters. We operate Pandora's Aquarium, an online support group with more than 20,000 registered members.

Recently, I was named a 2009 L'Oreal Woman of Worth for my volunteer work with Pandora's. I was chosen for this honor from more than 2,500 applicants.

Now, one of the ten 2009 Honorees will be selected as the national honoree through a public online vote. Her cause will get an additional $25,000, and a lot of media exposure. This is the first time L'Oreal has recognized a sexual violence organization, and becoming the national honoree would allow me to shine a spotlight on this issue that affects so many women and women.

Voting is easy - people just need to go to the url below, enter their email address in the box on the right, and click the "submit vote" button. Each email address is allowed one vote, and voting ends November 24.

http://www.womenofworth.com/Honorees/Honoree2009Detail.aspx?nomid=5657c940-425b-47a2-879d-ed3c2d82b56f

I am wondering if you might be willing to send people to this voting link via your (infinitely popular) twitter or blog. I understand if it's not something you can do, but my experience running a small-budget nonprofit tells me it's always wise to ask!

Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Shannon Lambert

I'll plug it happily.

Your correspondent asks "Will you be reading the original version where the wolf actually is killed, and not the 'oh my goodness our kids can't hear about death' version in which they bring him to the zoo?"

I fear she's in error; in the original version, written by Prokofiev, Peter snares the wolf, then convinces the hunters NOT to kill it, but to take it to the zoo.

I've been researching, and that's what I found out too. Wikipedia has a list of changes made in various versions of the story (Disney, for example, had the wolf not eat the duck). But the wolf was always taken to the zoo...

Actually, I'm going to have an all vampire scroll, I think. I ditched a bunch of reg dragons on it.

Both Lyd and Maya were out sick today. It's this chest thing. Lyd will most likely be out tomorrow, but omg Maya is going.

Meanwhile...

To clarify a question a lot of people have been asking me, the price change will occur at 5 pm EST tomorrow. So let's get those memberships in


Chip
chip@dragoncon.org

http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/11/radio-books-violin-lessons-also-haircut.html

Went in to KNOW radio station in ST Paul today and recorded an introduction to the NPR MORNING EDITION "Open Mike" piece I've been recording on audiobooks, and heard the edit. Asked them to see if they could find a bit more time in the piece for Audible founder Don Katz, who did an amazing interview and was pared down to about a sentence in the current edit. It'll go out in the next ten days, and as soon as I know when it goes out I'll put it up here. I talk to David Sedaris, Martin Jarvis, Don Katz and veteran audio producer/director Rick Harris in it.
Hi Neil,

I just read about your event in January, where in you will be narrating Peter and the Wolf. My husband and I are over joyed by this. We will hopefully be bringing our three girls up to see the performance. We did have one question though. Will you be reading the original version where the wolf actually is killed, and not the "oh my goodness our kids can't hear about death" version in which they bring him to the zoo? We are both, obviously, really hopeful that being you, and not afraid to scare children (thank you for that btw) will be speaking the true to the story version in which Peter shoots the wolf and then his dead body is paraded through the town as a trophy.

Thanks for your time,
~Cecily

PS- Do you know if there will be tickets for the event or the reception afterwards? It will be a long drive, and it would be nice to be prepared for either staking out seats all day or having tickets in hand. (We could not find any reservation information on the website)

I'd forgotten - or never knew - that there was an alternative version. The script I was sent is the Zoo version. I'll investigate...

And no, I do not know about tickets. I will find out.

Dear Neil,

Your Web Goblin offered to post photos of Coraline pumpkins, and when they were told this, my 8 and 11-year old daughters decided to make some. Here they are, along with 2 emoticon pumpkins and a turnip.

http://www.steampunkfamily.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/IMG_01521-300x225.jpg

I used them to illustrate a ghost story: http://www.steampunkfamily.com/2009/10/philomenas-fright/

Three of the four of us were Coraline characters for Halloween. (The 11-year old went her own way as Susan Sto-Helit.)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/37435081@N03/4077708519/sizes/l/in/set-72157622616148613/

The Other Mother is the scariest thing I've ever been for Halloween. All the children (even the 4-year olds!) knew who I was, and I elicited much nervous laughter when I offered to sew buttons in their eyes.

Thank you for being VERY SCARY INDEED

I love how many families were Coraline families, this year.

If, like me, anybody else was intrigued by your mention of Kenneth Grahame's other works and wants to read them with a minimum of searching, they'll be happy to know both 'The Golden Age' and 'Dream Days' are available for free on the always invaluable Project Gutenberg:

http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/291
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/270

Thanks for mentioning them in the first place; I'm always interested in children's lit of that time that has managed to slip through my net.

- B. Bolander

What a good idea. Two very beautiful, gently funny books by the author of The Wind in the Willows. I really enjoyed them, but stylistically they are, well, out of fashion, and will not be everybody's cup of Edwardian tea. Here's a passage that describes the illustration I put up yesterday, as small children steal through the house on a midnight expedition to obtain biscuits (ie cookies, if you are American):

The Blue Room had in prehistoric times been added to by taking in a superfluous passage, and so not only had the advantage of two doors, but enabled us to get to the head of the stairs without passing the chamber wherein our dragon-aunt lay couched. It was rarely occupied, except when a casual uncle came down for the night. We entered in noiseless file, the room being plunged in darkness, except for a bright strip of moonlight on the floor, across which we must pass for our exit. On this our leading lady chose to pause, seizing the opportunity to study the hang of her new dressing-gown. Greatly satisfied thereat, she proceeded, after the feminine fashion, to peacock and to pose, pacing a minuet down the moonlit patch with an imaginary partner. This was too much for Edward's histrionic instincts, and after a moment's pause he drew his single-stick, and with flourishes meet for the occasion, strode onto the stage. A struggle ensued on approved lines, at the end of which Selina was stabbed slowly and with unction, and her corpse borne from the chamber by the ruthless cavalier. The rest of us rushed after in a clump, with capers and gesticulations of delight; the special charm of the performance lying in the necessity for its being carried out with the dumbest of dumb shows.

Once out on the dark landing, the noise of the storm without told us that we had exaggerated the necessity for silence; so, grasping the tails of each other's nightgowns even as Alpine climbers rope themselves together in perilous places, we fared stoutly down the staircase-moraine, and across the grim glacier of the hall, to where a faint glimmer from the half-open door of the drawing-room beckoned to us like friendly hostel-lights. Entering, we found that our thriftless seniors had left the sound red heart of a fire, easily coaxed into a cheerful blaze; and biscuits—a plateful—smiled at us in an encouraging sort of way, together with the halves of a lemon, already once squeezed but still suckable. The biscuits were righteously shared, the lemon segments passed from mouth to mouth; and as we squatted round the fire, its genial warmth consoling our unclad limbs, we realised that so many nocturnal perils had not been braved in vain.

"It's a funny thing," said Edward, as we chatted, "how I hate this room in the daytime. It always means having your face washed, and your hair brushed, and talking silly company talk. But to-night it's really quite jolly. Looks different, somehow."

"I never can make out," I said, "what people come here to tea for. They can have their own tea at home if they like,—they're not poor people,—with jam and things, and drink out of their saucer, and suck their fingers and enjoy themselves; but they come here from a long way off, and sit up straight with their feet off the bars of their chairs, and have one cup, and talk the same sort of stuff every time."

Selina sniffed disdainfully. "You don't know anything about it," she said. "In society you have to call on each other. It's the proper thing to do."

"Pooh! YOU'RE not in society," said Edward, politely; "and, what's more, you never will be."

"Yes, I shall, some day," retorted Selina; "but I shan't ask you to come and see me, so there!"

"Wouldn't come if you did," growled Edward.

As of this evening, I have a working computer again. Everything seems to be working - in fact it's moving better than it has in months.

The only oopsie was that they forgot to turn the volume control back on. Fortunately, I was able to figure out how to re-enable the driver. And we're in business once more ;D

Not bad for a two day turnaround, huh?

I am really tired of today
and people.
but if I go to sleep now, tomorrow will be here.
and still people.

I'm not doin' so hot with the positive attitude thing today.

However, I did make an amazing dinner. It was breakfast. I'm probably going to die by 50.

PEOPLE ARE REALLY LUCKY I AM NOT A CRAZY VINDICTIVE BITCH.

so, anyway, I'm gonna go finish this book now. :D

Every once in awhile my Mac Pro errantly selects one of its older hard drives to boot from instead of the newest one I want it to boot from. I'm not sure why it does that, but it takes longer to boot and then I have to reboot again and hope it gets the right one.

I rarely if ever actually need to boot those drives, so my question is: is there a switch or file somewhere that I can flip or lock to make these drives (reversibly) un-bootable? Thanks.

This is the new bug. She's 7lbs, 8oz. She's 20 inches. 

She's awesome. 



And this is her with her awesome mommy. 

I'm not entirely sure I have words for all this. Tina's excited. She says, "Kay-cee-uh" every few minutes. 

So tomorrow - yeah nothing like waiting until the last minute, right? - a friend of mine from PA and her brand new husband (who lives in the UK and she'll be joining him next year there) are coming to town for the day to let me meet the new Mr. and generally just hang out. They are honeymooning in Orlando so they figured they'd come out for a day to Tampa.

Problem is I can't think of anything to do! It needs to be free/cheap (so no Busch Gardens or such) due to budget issues. And I'm just drawing a blank!

Any ideas of what to do/where to go/what to show them in their afternoon in Tampa Bay? Preferably something in the Citrus Park/Oldsmar/Clearwater possibly St Pete area. (I don't want to head too far east into Brandon/New Tampa area since it's out of my way and I don't know it well.) I could take them down to Clearwater Beach or something but...I don't know. Just walk around? Doesn't seem terribly interesting.

Ideas welcomed!

Jobsite Theater is hosting a food drive to benefit the food bank at Metropolitan Ministries for this final weekend of the smash-hit show Night of the Living Dead. With the holidays right around the corner, Jobsite hopes to help make a difference to Bay area families in need during what's been for many a very challenging year.

Anyone may bring two canned goods or other non-perishable food items within 90 minutes of curtain and receive a $10 ticket to see Night of the Living Dead on 11/12 at 8p, 11/14 at 8pm or 11/15 at 4pm. This offer is not valid on the 11/13 8pm performance. One $10 ticket will be offered per two items donated. Subject to availability. Not valid on prior sales or in conjunction with any other offer.

Metropolitan Ministries touches the lives of more than 22,000 households composed of hurting men, women, and children every year by providing food, a safe place to live, and hope for a new future. None of this would be possible without the generous support of the Tampa Bay community.


For more information on Night of the Living Dead visit http://jobsitetheater.org/livingdead.asp.

Additional questions regarding the food drive or the production may be directed to questions@jobsitetheater.org.

Having done the WoW.com interview, and having seen comments to it, and thinking over lots of comments I've heard inworld over the last year, I have drawn a rather depressing conclusion. It seems to me that the players who are most familiar with the game's "lore" are not interested in story, but are, instead, engaging in a sort of data mining, that they may then use said data in an "I-know-more-than-you" pissing contest. And, on the one hand, it's sad, because WoW ought to be about story, and on the other hand, most of the "lore" is so badly written that it pretty much amounts to The Simarillion for Dummies. People see internal logic where, in fact, there's usually only what was convenient for Blizzard. Anyway, I should never begin an entry on such a dispiriting point.

Yesterday....

Hoping that a change of scenery would jog something loose and help me get the proposal for Blood Oranges (working title) written, we left the House and went to the Athenaeum. And it worked, at least to some degree. I managed to get a rough version of the synopsis worked out. It still needs tweaking, and a bit more added on about the ending, and, of course, the book will not look much like the synopsis, but everyone involved knows that up front. I suspect it's a bit heavy on theme, and a bit light on plot, but that's not surprising. As I've said about a million times, I can't know a story before it happens, and it won't happen until I write it. To wit, a response to something I said yesterday, from Geoffrey (readingthedark):

However you go about it, the authenticity and commitment that you place in story (partially because of Campbell) coupled with how it's not real until it's actually written (and the day-to-day nature of the multiverse) means that you'll only know the story when it happens. Reducing the unknown into a proposal is tough because there's no way to guess the future when authenticity is all that really matters. Being meticulous and delicate and ruthless and telling nothing that could possibly be untrue doesn't fit into a spreadsheet no matter what you do.

Yeah. What he said.

When I was done at the Athenaeum, Spooky and I didn't really feel much like heading home. Instead, we drove east, past Brown University, to Wayland Square. We got coffee and cookies at a deli/coffee shop called, I think, The Edge. Good coffee, and cheaper than the swill from Starbucks. Then we spent some time in Myopic Books, which is just around the corner. We were good and bought nothing. The day was grey and chilly, though the temperature was in the mid sixties. The sky looked like snow. Before heading back across the river to Federal Hill, we stopped at Eastside Market, and I found myself staring at a full-wall display of Stephenie Meyers' idiotic "saga." And it occurred to me, not for the first time, that the people who did the art direction for the original covers of the Twilight books did a nice job. Would that my books had covers half that artful. Indeed, the original cover for Twlight would have made a far better cover for The Red Tree than the lurid "paranormal romance" template it was saddled with. Think about it. It's true.

---

Last night, I took off my writing hat (the conscious writing hat, I mean; the unconscious one never comes off), and Spooky and I spent three hours and forty-five minutes in a marathon grind for reputation with Timbermaw Hold in Wintersong and Felwood. Shortly after midnight, both Shaharrazad and Suraa reached exalted status, and were awarded the title Diplomat.

---

Please have a look at the current eBay auctions. Thanks.

And here are eleven photographs from yesterday:

( 10 November 2009 )

http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/11/murder-re-enacted.html

The Graveyard Book just won a literary award, which never gets old, and this one came with a medal, and also with a cheque. I thought, Hm. I have to get myself something with the cheque and I have to do it immediately, otherwise it will simply vanish into the day to day bank account of life, and I will never look at anything and go "Ah, that is the thing I got with my Graveyard Book Award."

Does anybody know the name or website of the Contact Lens booth that was in the dealers room on the lowest level of the Marriott this year?

we are looking for models for our 2011 calender if interested go to www.girlsofthecon.com

Just wondering -- is there anyplace where I can find a floorplan for next year's D*C?  That is, is there a map available that shows where and when events will take place?

I ask only because I don't wanna suffer from cranial overload like I did the first time I went to D*C back in '08.  I would like to have some kind of guide so that when I go next year, it'll make forming a plan a little bit easier, and I won't get so overwhelmed when I go again in 2010.

Thanks in advance.

http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/11/half-lifetime.html

The editor at CBS Sunday Morning asked if I had any photos of my son Mike back at the period when I first had the idea for The Graveyard Book - late 1985. I looked. We really didn't have any. I wandered next door and asked Mary (his mum, my former wife and for these last five years my friend and next-door neighbour) if she had any photos from back then. "No," she said. Then, "Do you mean those transparencies? I have them in an envelope somewhere." She vanished and came back with a large manila envelope from a long time ago. "Here."

Half a lifetime ago -- literally -- I was nearly 25, and working for magazines. Henry Fikret, who photographed a lot of the interviews I did, volunteered to take some photos of me and my family, and he did.A week later the envelope arrived, and I realised that everything he shot was on colour transparencies -- like huge slides -- and I was never sure what do with them, other than being fairly sure I couldn't take them down to Boots the Chemist and have prints knocked out. So they stayed in their envelope, and they kept their secrets, and were forgotten.

Yesterday I had the transparencies scanned, and finally got to see lots of pictures I had never actually seen before of Holly as a baby, Mike at the time that I would have watched him riding his tricycle around the graveyard, and me... at exactly half my age: A young journalist who had sold a very small handful of short stories and two non-fiction books, with dreams of writing fiction and comics. At the time I was dressing in grey, but was getting tired of the way that you would buy something grey and take it home and discover that it was a blueish grey or a brownish grey, and wondering if I'd have the same problem if I just started to dress in black.

And half a lifetime on, it seemed like it might be good to put one up here. I checked, and Mary didn't mind. What odd clothes we wore back then. What big glasses. And look, my hair is practically normal.





So long ago, and it went like the blink of an eye.

I’m setting up a touring schedule for mid-January, to wrap around the Sci-Fi Con I’m doing in Williamsburg, VA.

Here’s where I’m gonna be. I’d love to find bookstores / bars / venues to do signings along the way:

January 7th, drive to Atlanta, mebbe set something up that night.
January 8th – drive to Greensboro – I may have a signing already there...
January 10th –I have a signing set up in DC. Details to follow!
Hey, folks in Baltimore & Richmond! Can you guys think of any places that might like to have me come in the 11th-13th?
January 14th-17th - MarsCon in Williamsburg, VA
January 18th – Drive the 9ish hours to Atlanta
January 19 – Back to New Orleans!
January 20 - Mardi Gras. Fall down, go boom, then do more local signings.

If you know places that might host me, please help, cuz I don’t know them, and I don’t know the people what run ‘em. So, if you want me to come to your town, sign some books, and have a couple of cocktails with you, please, give the store a call, find out if they’re amenable to doing a signing, and send me their contact info so I can set it up.

Please don’t just send me an email saying, “there’s this cool place down the street” – there’s no way I can cold call all these people (who often aren’t in when called, anyway) & chase down leads.

2010 looks like the year that everything changes. New ways of thinking, new ideas to put out into the world, new challenges. I’m a little freaked out & not entirely unterrified, but a good friend recently told me that my fear response seems to be to get very focused, wind myself up, and launch off the cliff.

Here’s hoping something out there catches me:)

There's not a whole lot to say about yesterday. I did not "hammer out" the proposal for Blood Oranges. Instead, I sat here all day, making notes for the book, trying to find something like a plot. That provisional plot I inevitably use for proposals, which often looks very little like the finished book. I think I may include the proposal for The Red Tree in Sirenia Digest #48, as an example, because I read back over it yesterday, and I truly am grateful the book described therein is not the book I ended up writing. It'll be the same way this time, but even knowing that makes this no easier. I'm just no good at "hammering out" prose, even provisional prose. My response to the received wisdom of writing instructors and workshops that one should never be afraid of writing a bad first draft...well, it's rude, my response, and centers on my general unwillingness to write anything badly.

I did come up with two names yesterday, the name of the narrator (yes, it's another first-person narrative)— India Phelps —and the name of her lover— Eva Canning. I lifted Eva from "Werewolf Smile," from Sirenia Digest #45, though this Eva will be a very different Eva from that Eva. It's not much, but it's a start.

I am thinking that today I'll be going to a library to continue my notes and the working out of this puzzle, in hopes that by tomorrow I'll be ready to write the proposal/synopsis thing, however provisional it might be. And I still have a short story to write for Bill Schafer at subpress this month, and two pieces to write for Sirenia Digest #48. That means I have, at best, twenty days remaining to get all this work done, having lost most of those first ten days of November.

Please have a look at the current eBay auctions. Thanks.

I forgot to mention that Spooky and I read and adored David Petersen's Mouseguard Fall 1152, and are now looking forward to Winter 1152.

However, last night we watched the series premiere of the V remake (it really is a remake, and not a "reboot"), thanks to Hulu, and I was not so impressed. Thing is, I was never much of a fan of the original series, and I saw very little last night that improved upon it. Sure, Morena Baccarin does a superb job, and is extremely easy on the eyes. But that's about all the first episode had going for it. Partly, it's that this new V is weighed down by the blandness that usually infects network television. Interchangeable, forgettable characters reciting forgettable, interchangeable dialogue. I'll watch again next week, but I'm no longer optimistic.

And now I need to get dressed and slip out into the chilly grey day.

Remember that the 2010 Membership price increases $10 to $70 on 11/13 (Friday)! Get them while they are still $60!!!