Results tagged “neil gaiman”

This is all to say, he had a mind that was worth exploring, and this is where Neil Gaiman, one of today’s most gifted storytellers comes in. Gaiman collects and coalesces a plethora of printed and recorded materials to create a historical record which is less like a traditional biography than it is an extended conversation with the author himself.

Oh, and then there’s all the wonderful trivia you’ll pick up along the way. Do you remember which of the Hitchhikers’ books Douglas Adams’ hated? The one he was depressed and worried that he was no longer writing in his own voice while producing? Do you know which television show, currently experiencing its own revival, in which Douglas was involved?

It’s all here, including insight into many of the author’s thoughts as his own journey through The Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Universe spread out before him. Further separating this from so many other biographies out there is how very readable this is. I found that once I got going, I would lose track of time and the number of pages I had run through.

Among my favorite bits in this book, is the section on the Hitchhikers’ computer game. Do you remember that game? If you need a refresher, you can play it here: The Hitchhikers’ Guide computer game. Anyway, I remember it as one of the more frustrating experiences of my early computer gaming years. Mind you, by the time I found it, this game had already been out for a while, so there was plenty of help to be found when I was ready to turn to it. But that first experience of trying to go through it blind…well, I could have used a towel. So it was interesting to read that Doug found this to be among one of the most rewarding and interesting additions to The Hitchhikers’ Guide universe.

Here are the other book, DVD and movie releases for the week!

HARDCOVER BOOKS

• Absolute Death by Neil Gaiman

PAPERBACK BOOKS

• Terminator Salvation: Cold War by Greg Cox

DVDS

• Blood: The Last Vampire
• Plastic Man: The Complete Collection
• Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
• Waterworld [Blu-ray]

IN THEATERS FRIDAY

• Astro Boy
• Cirque Du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant
• The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D
• Saw VI

The Hugo Awards have been announced at the 2009 Worldcon!

Here are the winners!

• Best Novel: The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman
• Best Novella: The Erdmann Nexus, Nancy Kress
• Best Novelette: Shoggoths in Bloom, Elizabeth Bear
• Best Short Story: Exhalation, Ted Chiang
• Best Related Book: Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008, John Scalzi
• Best Graphic Story: Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones, Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne Wright
• Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form: WALL-E, Andrew Stanton & Pete Docter, story; Andrew Stanton & Jim Reardon, screenplay; Andrew Stanton, director
• Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form: Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, Joss Whedon, & Zack Whedon, & Jed Whedon, & Maurissa Tancharoen, writers; Joss Whedon, director
• Best Editor Short Form: Ellen Datlow
• Best Editor Long Form: David G. Hartwell
• Best Professional Artist: Donato Giancola
• Best Semiprozine: Weird Tales, edited by Ann VanderMeer & Stephen H. Segal
• Best Fan Writer: Cheryl Morgan
• Best Fanzine: Electric Velocipede edited by John Klima
• Best Fan Artist: Frank Wu

I want to give a special congratulations to David Anthony Durham! I’ve known David before he published Acacia, when he hired me to be his webmaster. He has always been kind, polite, a gentleman and a boss willing to endure whatever hardship I sent his way. If you haven’t read Acacia, why haven’t you?

Honestly. It is fantastic and its sequel, The Other Lands, publishes in a matter of weeks.

Congrats to the winners and congrats to those who were nominated! You all are in great company.

Now. Get back to reading! It’s what we do, right?

It’s one of the biggest events going on during Comic-Con: the Will Eisner Comics Industry Awards, or “The Eisners” for short. It honors some of the best of the best working in the industry and pays tribute to the most well-known of names (like Mike Mignola) to the integral but sometimes overlooked comics workers, like those nominated for Best Lettering. It’s an opportunity to celebrate, educate, and have a little fun.

So why is so little written about them?

Well, here at Suvudu we’re trying to bring the Eisners to you in a big way. We ran a shakedown of many of the Eisner categories, we tabulated our results, and we filmed the ceremony. Now it’s time to bring the show to you. This year’s show brings some humor to the preceedings as well as a few of those big names. It was an interesting awards ceremony and now it’s your turn to see how it all went down.

With that in mind, let’s start the show. And the nominees are…

Patton Oswalt Presents the Best Publication for Kids & Best Publication for Tweens/Teens

Patton Oswalt opens the awards with a touch of humor and some minor difficulty with name pronunciation. We can’t fault him there. Check out the awards and speeches in the video below.

This is what two Neil Gaiman fans look like when they are shut out from seeing one of their favorite writers at a Comic Con!

The bald bloke on the left happens to be me. You can’t see it but there is an actual tear falling with melancholic slowness down my right cheek. The beautiful but just as sorrowfully pouty woman on the right is author Diana Rowland. We both, along with author Jackie Kessler, woke up early Comic Con Friday to try and win a lottery to see Neil, get some things signed and bask in his presence.

None of us won.

It was not meant to be.

It’s just one of those things at Comic Con. Even if you show up early and have saved a dozen kittens from drowning in the last week—supposedly giving you a great deal of karma at these events, I am told—you still might not get to meet the people you want.

So, Neil, we missed ya, buddy! Hope to see you soon though!

Neil Gaiman is a rock star.

No. Really. He is. And deservedly so.

As I helped Terry Brooks wrap up an autographing session at the San Diego Comic Con that took two hours instead of the alotted one, Neil strolled in through the back entrance of the Autographing Hall surrounded by an entourage of movie studio publicsts, drivers, bouncers and handlers. It was an impressive sight for one of the most gracious, smart and humble authors I know.

I wonder what he thinks about it sometimes.

He strolled up to the table where five or six chairs were set up. On the other side of the table a long, snaking line of his adoring fans waited to meet him and have stuff signed. The people in line had been waiting patiently for more than an hour; they were the lucky winners of a lottery held earlier in the day that I, sadly, was not a winner in.

Thousands of people, like me, had their day crushed just after breakfast.

Neil, Henry Selick (director), Teri Hatcher (voice lending actress) and several others quickly joined the master writer in support of the BluRay release of the movie Coraline, my favorite animated movie this year thus far. Flashes from cameras erupted from the fans when the cast sat down and they were soon signing press packets featuring the DVD. Neil also signed other items, curious about where people lived, what they enjoyed most about Comic Con and any other bevy of questions to make the fans feel comfortable in his presence.

After all, he is bigger than Elvis.

Or hadn’t you heard?

I wish I could have gotten my Whatever Happened To The Caped Crusader? comic book set signed by Neil. I am green as the Hulk with envy for those people who were in line!

I guess it will have to wait for another time!

Let the rock star tour again!

Here are the other book, DVD and movie releases for the week!

HARDCOVER BOOKS

• The Price of Spring by Daniel Abraham
• Fahrenheit 451: The Authorized Adaptation by Ray Bradbury and Tim Hamilton
• The Gods of Amyrantha by Jennifer Fallon
• Batman: Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader? by Neil Gaiman and Andy Kubert
• Death’s Head: Day of the Damned by David Gunn
• The Kingdom Beyond the Waves by Stephen Hunt
• Sandman Slim by Richard Kadrey

PAPERBACK BOOKS

• A Fire in the North by David Bilsborough
• High Bloods by John Farris
• The Calling by David Mack

DVDS

• 300: The Complete Experience
• Coraline
• Stargate SG-1: Children of the Gods
• Robot Chicken: Star Wars - Episode II
• Watchmen (Director’s Cut)

IN THEATERS FRIDAY

• G-Force
• Orphan

I’ve professed this before.

Neil Gaiman is a god.

Or maybe he’s just a very talented writer with a fantastic imagination who has the ability to succinctly make a point with a flare!

A few days ago on his Journal, Gaiman decided to answer a question posed him by a fan concerning the perceived lateness of A Dance With Dragons by George. R. R. Martin. My thoughts on this were documented in my article In Defense of George R. R. Martin, so it won’t surprise anyone that I fall on the side of Gaiman and his opinion.

Gaiman sums it up quite nicely with one sentence:

“George R.R. Martin is not your bitch.”

That’s right! He said it! George is not your bitch.

Pause. Soak it in. Become one with the philosophy.

It is important to point out that Gaiman didn’t need to answer that question. He decides which questions to answer and post on his Journal. The spite many send toward Martin is a spite most authors are aware of on some level; I can’t even tell you how many author events I’ve attended where a fan asks the writer what they think of George R. R. Martin. For whatever reason, Gaiman felt it necessary to chime in on the subject.

You can read the entirety of his thoughts on his May 12th Journal!

Gaiman makes some great points. I’ll post two I think are important.

You have to love some of the little oddities that you find along your surfings on the web. This is one such item and it involves a small project by one of my favorite storytellers as he warmed up for a new project.

This is a Neil Gamain short story brought to life by Gahan Wilson. As Gaiman writes on his blog concerning this very video, this was a writing exercise that he undertook on his way to writing The Graveyard Book. It found it’s way into a story collection of the same name edited by Art Spiegelman and Francoise Mouly, and now animated by Gahan Wilson.

Hot dog there’ve been some talented hands all over this story!

And as if all of that wasn’t enough, check this out: this little bit of animation comes via The New Yorker (of all places). Just saying that makes me feel all kinds of intellectual and somewhat swarthy. We’re breaking new ground here. Well, actually, maybe they’re doing that over at the New Yorker as well. Regardless, this is a really well-done web video and everyone involved deserves a pat on the back.

The story involves a group of kids who’s get together is crashed by the undead*, who teach them all manner of new and fantastic games. Also, there’s a little jazz involved.

Check it out below:

Where do writers get their ideas?

A simple enough question, right? After all, ideas like everything else must come from somewhere. Other than questions about movies, the question about ideas plagues every writer. It never goes away. There are many would-be writers out there curious about the process an author goes through, a process the fan hopes to emulate.

Ironically enough, it is a question only the asker can answer.

Once upon a time, Neil Gaiman would answer with a flip comment:

• “Where do you get your ideas, Neil?” the fan asks.
• “From the Idea-of-the-Month Club,” Neil says with a straight face.
• The fan frowns. “Huh?”
• “From a dusty old book full of ideas in my basement,” Neil adds.
• The fan is not amused.
• “I make them up,” Neil finally relents. “Out of my head.”

The final answer Neil gives is of course the one the fan doesn’t want to hear. There is no magic in it, no wonder. It reduces the act of writing to hard work and sweat. The answer is also an act the fan cannot easily replicate if they are an aspiring writer.

I mean, who but Neil Gaiman can be in Neil Gaiman’s head?

Other authors have classic responses:

• “Where do you get your ideas, Mr. Ellison?”
• “Poughkeepsie,” Harlan growls and takes a different question.

Harlan, Harlan, Harlan. We love you, Harlan!

Terry Brooks, who recently visited the Dubai Literary Festival and took a smattering of various questions, has his own response:

• “Where do you get your ideas, Terry?”
• “Well,” Terry replies with an impish grin. “You see, I have this little box.”
• The fan listens intently, ready to catalogue the answer.
• “I open it and an idea just flies out!” Terry says.
• The fan lowers their pencil, now smirking.
• “The trick is catching it!” Terry finishes, grinning.

Well, the truth is quite different for Terry and most writers out there.

Can you handle the truth?

Neil has it right. Terry has it right. Even Harlan probably has it right. Ideas come from within, in our own heads, but can also be triggered by things we see in the real world.

The real world, eh? How does that work?

I will tell you.

It’s the question all authors say they hate most: Where do you get your ideas?

Harlan Ellison famously answered what must have been the thousandth iteration of this question by saying his ideas came from a post office box in Schenectady: you send in two dollars and a self-addressed stamped envelope and they send you back an idea.

Some authors have given up being glib. People ask Neil Gaiman where he gets his ideas: “‘I make them up,’ I tell them. ‘Out of my head.’” Not a very satisfying answer, perhaps, but a true one. Writing is a hard profession, and stories don’t just emerge fully formed from the craniums of literary geniuses in a single burst. Author Lawrence Watt-Evans pointed out that the problem isn’t actually getting the ideas, it’s choosing which one to use. And executing them is just as difficult and quirky. Author Peter Brett found he worked best on his commute to work, thumbing in his epic fantasy on his smart phone. And where does he still go to be inspired when he’s stuck? The F train.

So it’s rare for an idea to come at you wholesale out of the fog, shrouded in mystery and adventure. But that’s exactly what happened to Robert Redick, author of The Red Wolf Conspiracy, when he was in Argentina. A little more indirect than Schenectady, perhaps… but I’ll let Robert tell you how it happened.

With Hugo Awards Nominations out I thought it would be fun to see the reaction from some of the nominee’s as well as other buzz.



Nominees

Neil Gaiman

Cory Doctorow

John Scalzi

Other sites of interest

io9.com

Hugo Nominees Available As E-Books (For Judges Only)



Wired

It’s Doctor vs. Doctor for the Hugo Nominations



Eos Books - The Next Chapter

FREE HUGO SHORT STORIES: Ken Macleod and Greg Egan

In one week, Coraline will be released in theaters. It is a fantastic movie, kind of a dark cross between the book The Wizard of Oz and the Victorian story Alice in Wonderland, and I think audiences will fall in love with it as I fell in love with it.

Neil Gaiman, the author who wrote the book Coraline that Henry Selick adapted into the 3D stop motion movie, has been doing some fun stuff for the release of this film. He attended the premiere, he is attending the movie’s release at the Dublin Film Festival, and he has put together a short little trailer of his own for Coraline.

Buttons. Buttons everywhere. Are you scared of buttons?

Neil Gaiman at his delightfully creepiest. Hope you enjoy it! And on a different topic altogether, Neil has sold the rights for The Graveyard Book to Neil Jordan to adapt the recent Newbery Medal winner into a film. Good stuff! Can’t wait to see that book adapted to the silver screen!

Today I went to an advance screening for the forthcoming new movie, Coraline. Adapted and directed by Henry Selick (The Nightmare Before Christmas) from the Neil Gaiman book, Coraline is just simply a fantastic movie for most ages. 3D goodness! 3D goodness! 3D goodness! I will be writing a much longer review here in a few days when it is allowed, but all I can say is I loved it.

Here is the new and probably last trailer for Coraline. Hope you enjoy it! And be sure to buy your tickets now to go see it when it is released on February 6th. Get your 3D glasses ready! I truly doubt you’ll be disappointed!

I know it seems as if I’ve been writing a lot about Neil Gaiman as of late. The reason it seems that way is because: I am!

Neil has a lot going on right now. He released The Graveyard Book a few months ago. The movie adaptation of his book Coraline is coming to a theater near you on February 6th. And he is writing the “final” two issues of the comic books Batman and Detective Comics. A busy man with fun projects on his hands deserving of posted news.

Well, all of his hard work has paid off extra today, leaving what I would imagine a huge smile on his face.

The American Library Association has awarded Neil Gaiman the Newbery Medal for The Graveyard Book!

In 1993, a year after DC Comics killed Superman, the comic book publisher also destroyed Batman, probably their second most beloved character. Emotionally and physically exhausted from a long stretch of villainous activity in Gothem, Batman is literally broken when a villain named Bane breaks the back of Bruce Wayne. Hobbled by Bane and having to work through intensive physical therapy, Bruce Wayne handed the mantle of Batman over to another. Life just isn’t easy for ole Bats. Just as they did with Superman, DC proved they were willing to do the darkly imaginative when it came to their best characters. No comic book character was safe if DC could take out Batman for a year.

Well, it is happening again to Batman in February and March 2009!

China Mieville is, put quite simply, an amazing writer. To me he is right up there with Neil Gaiman in sheer storytelling genius and writing talent. Huge praise, I know, but it is true. The literary tales he weaves is only matched by his ability to string words together in beautiful prose. From the moment I read Perdido Street Station I was hooked.

US Del Rey Cover

UK Macmillan Cover

I also hate China. He is one of those writers who makes me want to quit writing because how on Earth can I write anything comparable and worthy?

Okay, okay, I don’t hate China. He also happens to be one of the coolest and nicest guys you’ll ever meet. But you get the idea.

Well, he has a new book coming out this year and I want to start talking about it early. For all of his talent, China really hasn’t garnered a huge reading audience and I think that is one of the travesties in this genre. The City & the City will be released this May 2009. I hope many of you will be reading it with me!

I posted both the US and the UK covers above. This time I like how clean the US cover is despite Del Rey and Macmillan using the same cover artwork. Goes to show how color can really change the feel of a book. Kudos to the Del Rey art department on this one!

So, anyone else out there love China? Looking forward to the new book?

In the last few days, Seattle has been buried under a thick white blanket of snow.

The winter storm hitting the Pacific Northwest has been one of Seattle’s most sustained, leaving it mostly incapacitated. Buses have crashed through protective guard rails, people have stranded their cars and 4x4 trucks. For good reason. I look outside and see more than a foot of snow covering everything. After ten days, temperatures have finally risen over the freezing mark but not enough to make the tiniest of dent in what has been done to the city.

I wouldn’t have it any other way.

As I sit here, tucked away in my heater-driven warmth and looking out my living room window, it evokes one of my favorite books—The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman.

Lyra Belacqua riding the armored polar bear Iorek Byrnison through the snowy wilds.

It got me thinking.

I wrote a few days ago how I have been asked to moderate a panel devoted to writers’ influences at the NY Comic Con. I already have planned what I want to open with and once that is done I’ll just let the authors go crazy wild with their stories and what writers influences them want to be writers. But I also realized each one of us—and I mean every one of us who come to Suvudu—has some definable moment in our lives when we fell in love with science fiction and/or fantasy. It could be a book we read or a comic book we collected or a movie we watched or a gaming experience we had… one moment in a past full of moments created how we spend our time today.

Can you remember what sci-fi/fantasy writers or movies or games placed you on the path to this moment?

Here are the other culprits that have led me to write my own book as well as blogging here on Suvudu…

Big fan of Neil Gaiman here. Have been for years. He is a very genuine and warm author, despite the black leather jacket and the rock star black sun glasses, and he simply has more talent than I care to admit. At least I get to read that talent and be very entertained.

From the more childlike—and possibly twisted—part of Gaiman’s imagination came Coraline, a young adult book with a great story. Now that story has been given the Hollywood treatment! Henry Selick, the director who brought us The Nightmare Before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach, has adapted Coraline into a screenplay and is directing its journey to the silver screen. With voice work by Dakota Fanning, Ian McShane and Teri Hatcher, the movie is sure to be a hit when it is released on February 6, 2009.

Above is a new trailer! And it looks great. Just as dark and twisted as I had hoped with its sentiments still firmly rooted in the childhood experience.

The question now is: How long before we see The Graveyard Book brought to the screen? It seems to me that the director style of Henry Selick would be perfect for Gaiman’s latest book…