No Country for Old Typewriters: A Well-Used One Heads to Auction
Christie’s will auction Cormac McCarthy’s Olivetti typewriter that he used to type every book he has written, including three not published.
First look: Harry Potter enters real world in ‘Deathly Hallows’
USA Today offers a first look into Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, the seventh, and last, book in J.K. Rowling’s series which is being broken into two films, the first part coming out in November 2010.
DailyLit Announces Move to All Free
DailyLit, a site that offers books in installments via email or RSS, is now offering its service free of charge!
Neil Gaiman Asks: Heard Any Good Books Lately?
In this NPR piece, Gaiman ponders the future of audiobooks and talks to David Sedaris and Martin Jarvis about what makes a great audiobook — and a great reader.
And it wouldn’t be the end of the year without lots of booklists! Take a look at these:
100 Notable Books of 2009
The New York Times features a number of booklists to help you with your holiday shopping. Take a look at this list of the 100 notable books of 2009.
Books of the year: what kept you turning the pages?
The Guardian asks novelist, actors, critics and other notables what books kept them reading throughout 2009.
posted by Neil
For those of you who missed it, here's the NPR "Open Mike" piece I did on audiobooks... You can listen to it here, or download it, or email it...
And here, at closer to full length, are the interviews I did with Martin Jarvis and David Sedaris. If you enjoyed the piece, they are filled with wonderful bits that didn't make it in. And the Martin Jarvis interview is practically a masterclass in how to approach doing Audiobooks.
(The strangest moment for me in the Martin Jarvis interview is when he talks about remembering the voices of teachers, and names John Branston and Dick Glynne Jones. I went to Whitgift School in Croydon, which Martin had also attended twenty years before me, and I was taught by both of them. I was in John Branston's production of Julius Caesar at the Fairfield Halls -- and was taught O-level English by Dick Glynne Jones. As he said their names, I thought "He can't be talking about the same people..." but of course, he was.)
There's a sort of interview with me, and a gallery of snapshots, over at
http://www.lomography.com/magazine/lomoamigos/2009/11/30/neil-gaiman-shoots-with-the-lc-a-plus. I love the low-tech magic of the camera, and the wonderful hodgepodge nature of the shots, a mixture of art of documentary, such as the moment when a collapsing shelf deposited the contents of a make-up bag into a toilet, to Amanda's doomed attempts to make friends with sheep, or a photo that should not have come out of my goddaughters watching the DVD of Coraline with their 3D specs on...
For me, the most exciting bit is that they gave Dave McKean a camera to play with. I can't wait to see what he did.
I've grabbed a few more shots from their gallery. Here's the Queen of Sheep herself...
Maddy's friend Claire, at San Diego airport...
And here's Ivy McCloud (almost invisible, far right) and my goddaughters and their friend...
posted by Neil
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.
Also popped in to DreamHaven and signed a bunch of books. The piles of books have grown so high, and the administration was proving so hard for Greg now that he is a one-man operation that I'm no longer personalising books there. But lots of signed books now in for the Holidays at
DreamHaven's Neilgaiman.net site.
Spent much of the rest of the day driving around, being a dad, taking a daughter and her friend to violin, all that normal sort of stuff, and listening to Martin Jarvis's Good Omens audiobook as I did so. I'm about half-way through it now. It makes me so happy, especially hearing Adam Young read in something sort of close to Martin's Just William voice. Weirdly, I found it easier to hear what I wrote and what Terry wrote than I could if I looked at the text (which I discovered a few years ago, when I proofread the Harper Collins edition). The text is a bit of a blur, after all these years, but listening I'd find myself going, "Me... Terry.... Me in first draft, Terry in second.... Terry in first draft, me in second.... My footnote to his bit.... His footnote to mine..." feeling vaguely like an archaeologist. Even spotted a couple of tiny continuity goofs we should have caught 21 years ago that I may call Terry about and correct in future editions.
(She has an East Coast Tour on right now -
11.12 Portland, ME
11.13 Northampton, MA
11.14 Brooklyn, NY (SOLD OUT)
11.18 Philadelphia, PA
11.19 Falls Church, VA
11.20 Carrboro, NC
11.22 Knoxville, TN.
Go see her in concert. She's a wonder live. Tell her I said hi.)
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
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