Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/beowulf/index.htm  

In the second trailer, her feet appear to have stiletto heels.
  

    
Happy Birthday, Neil!

Many blessings!

Mary
  

    
I finally made it out to see Beowulf, IMAX 3D.  I still say Grendel's
mom has had a stiletto heel surgically attached to her heel.  You don't
walk on hooves like that. 
  

    
It was a weird set of hooves, admittedly.  Perhaps it was another nod
to the prisons of vanity.
  

    
I am in agreement about the heels.  It definitely looked like
high-heeled shoes to me.

I have been listening to the audiobook of Neverwhere, and I can't
recommend it highly enough.  It was like Himself rode around in my car
with me and told me a story.  I do have to admit that my memory of
Neil's voices for Croup and Vandemar from the reading he did on that
tour in '96 was not the same as what he did in the audiobook, but I
suspect I'm getting old.  And his Marquis de Carrabas was delightful.

Also, my copy of Absolute Sandman Vol. 2 is faboo!

Hope you are all well--I don't come here enough anymore, and I miss
you guys.

Mary (reading Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramhansa Yogananda)
  

    
Hi all,

I'm new to the Well, and was poking about, and found this group.
Hopefully it's not bad form to say hello in a conversation topic that's
gone slightly comatose. 

(the-roane), I've been using my commute to catch up on the audiobooks,
and most recently listened to _Fragile Things_. There's so much good
stuff to talk about in Neil's work, but I'm not quite sure where to
start (the hundreds of posts to go through is a bit daunting, but I'll
catch up soon, I'm sure). Anyone up for a conversation?
  

    
Anyone here looking forward to the online release of American Gods?  I
have a few people I plan to send the link to.

I'm curious to see how HarperCollins does it. From the press release,
it's sounding like a web-based pseudo-PDF thing, probably Flash, to
prevent people from extracting the text.  As opposed to Tor, which is
now offering free books in plaintxt, HTML, and .mobi without the month
limit.  Still, baby steps -- this is progress and a good opportunity to
introduce new readers to Neil!

As Neil and others have said, obscurity is a worse threat to authors
than piracy.  I don't think Neil has to worry about the former any time
soon, so I think this is a very different test case than offering a
book by someone less known, for which I would expect to see a more
dramatic sales increase.  I feel like Neil's core demographics can't
help but have been exposed to him already, so this experiment can only
succeed by drawing readers from outside those.  Versus someone like
Scalzi or Bear who I know of and follow online but who, to my shame, I
haven't read much of yet.

Anyway. Rambling.  I guess that was more about the dynamics of book
demographics than Neil's actual work.

Uhm.... everyone else excited for Odd and the Frost Giants?  I got the
notice that mine shipped, but it's on the slow boat over so it'll be a
while.
  

    
I likewise have a list of people I plan to inflict, er, send American
Gods to. Although, it's really quite a litmus test; some people
absolutely adore it, and some want those hours of their life back --
even if they've liked Neil's previous work. It's not quite like the
short story collections, where my gauge was whether or not someone
liked Borges. So, softly, softly. 

Re: Odd and the Frost Giants -- ooh, I'll go order it forthwith. 
  

    
Let me know how Odd is.

I wasn't that excited about a YA book.
  

    
It came in the mail yesterday!  I haven't started it yet, as I have a
week of international travel ahead of me.  The illustrations by Mark
Buckingham tickle the nostalgic kid in me, though, evoking the Greatest
Classics Illustrated line.
  

    
valtrull--wellcome!  We're glad to have you here.  And I'm always
willing to talk about Himself.

I liked Odd and the Frost Giants.  It is a YA novel (ette?) and I had
a feeling there wasn't quite enough room for Neil to expand some of the
themes in there, but I enjoyed it.  Then again, I have never actively
disliked anything of his--I like some things better than others
(Neverwhere being a particular favorite, I suspect because of the
Marquis de Carrabas), but I can't say I have disliked anything.

valtrull--have you listened to the new audiobook of Neverwhere yet?  I
really loved that one.  My first Neil signing was for that book, back
in '96, and it was so neat to hear him read it again.

I'm not really into downloading books--I haven't planned to send AG to
anyone yet.  I've loaned out my "Smoke and Mirrors" to everyone I
know, and I think it's a better example of Neil's range as a writer.  I
agree with valtrull that AG is a love-it-or-hate-it sort of book.
DanGuy, be sure to post the reactions you get.  I'm curious.

OK, I must go plan lessons for this week.  later.

Mary (reading The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver) 
  

    
I really liked Odd and can't wait to read it to the kids once we
finish Ranma 1/2 vol 3.  I liked the character of Odd and felt that the
ending was thoroughly sweet and satisfying.
  

    
(the-roane) -- Thanks for the welcome! Yes, I've listened to
Neverwhere, and liked that quite a bit. I picked up much more of the
story than I did when watching the DVDs, though I sort of expected
that. How can one not love the Marquis? I've also listened to Stardust,
and Fragile Things. (I have an atrocious commute.)

After several years of resistance, my mother grudgingly admitted to me
that she's reading American Gods and loving the book. 'I had no idea
he was such a good writer!' she said. 'The ontology! The layers of
meaning! The allusions!' 

'Uh, YEAH, mom. Hello! I've only been telling you there's a reason
he's won all these awards, for fun.' 

That amused me no end. Let's see how she likes Smoke and Mirrors. I
agree with you, (the-roane), that it's a much better sample of Neil's
range than AG. 
  

    
OoOoh! I was flipping thru the TV today and passing thru & caught
Roseanne repeat where Jackie is getting ready to marry Fred & she's
upstairs in Roseanne's attic room where, who, Darlene stays? There's
this poster on the door. The Endless. I had to stop and watch and try
to see which one it was. I think it may have been Still Life with Cats.
Little excitements. Sigh. 
  

    
Yeah, Darlene has an Endless poster on her wall that the viewer can
see every once in a while.  I think there was another notable poster,
but I've forgotten what it was.

Joss Whedon was a writer for the show, but I think it was some other
fan on the show who was responsible for the poster.

I know it's been written up before, but it's been so long that I don't
remember what the details were, sorry.
  

    
FWIW, IMDB attributes the posters to Joss Whedon. Was it this one?
<http://tinyurl.com/3xv5mz>
  

    
Yes! That's it! And it is the Still Life With Cats. I wish they'd
reissue it. Even back when I made money, I didn't have enough to pay
what that's going for. 
  

    
DC's selling it as a wall scroll... which I'm not sure I dig the
junior-high feel of, but on the other hand, it's some good art. Hrm.
Maybe if I strew some Tiger Beat and Kerrang! magazines around the
room, it would work...
  

    
Where can one get that? And how much is it?
  

    
The item page reads, 'Contact your local comics retailer for
availability,' so I'd try talking to your local comic store and seeing
if they'd order it for you. Or try somewhere like G-mart, a good online
comic retailer. 
  

    
Ah. I see a trip to Bedrock Comics in my near future.
  

    
Or, you could always try Dreamhaven Books, too. 
  

    
Checked there. Don't see it there.
  

    
Jouni Koponen, who has stopped in here from time to time, has just
announced that he is adapting Odd into a comic.

http://jounikoponen.blogspot.com/2008/04/odd-and-frost-giants.html
  

    
Sweet!