Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    
Suzanne - Last Easter, a good friend and I went and saw High Fidelity.
Now, neither of us had read the book, but we're both in our late 20's
at the time (I've since crossed the threshhold) and therefore of the
Golden Era of Cusack. Her biggest thing was the fact that there was not
one, not two, but THREE John Cusack in the rain scenes.

Michelle - Oh NOOOOOO! I hope that you are able to get in touch with
him! I hope to come and hear Bastet's Dream perform some day and sit in
the front row and throw dainty underclothes at you.
And needless to say, I'll be at the Berkeley signing.

Dan Guy - Interesting that she excised stories from collections. I've
never seen that before... 
  

    
Hmmmm... three John Cusacks in the rain scenes. Missed that.  Means
I'm probably going to have to unpack the box of videos (attempting to
leave this house one day and doing the preemptive strike of packing in
the probably mistaken assumption that it will force me to decide
quicker).

A cheer from this person since it seems we will finally get to hear
the photo story! ::fingers crossed::

Suzanne, who really needs to get to work now...
  

    
I love John Cusack movies.  I have a soft spot for most 80s movies,
particularly the ones directed by Cameron Crowe and John Hughes, and
the ones featuring John Cusack (and/or Molly Ringwald and/or Anthony
Michael Hall).  And, of course, there's a wonderful overlap between
those of the first class and the second.
     Of the Venn-diagram-like overlaps of the two sets, those movies
featuring all three actors, such as "16 Candles", rate high on my list,
as do movies featuring only two of the actors, like "Fast Times at
Ridgemont High", but I think that my favourite all time 80s movie is
"say anything", which of the three has only John Cusack.  What a flick.
 I totally lived that relationship -- well, everything except the sex,
the happy ending, and the fact that she actually liked him. 
Everything else though.  The similarities between this girl and Diane
Cort were astonishing, even down to the speech she gave when she dumped
me.  I hadn't seen the movie at the time; I really wonder if she had.

     Regardless.... John Cusack..., yah.
     I rather like the end of "High Fidelity".  I read the book years
before the movie came out (though I suppose it couldn't have been more
than three years tops) and don't recall the ending, and whether it was
the same in the film.  I imagine it was.  Suffices to say that the
movie's end has stayed with me in a way that the end of the book has
not.  (Which is not necessarily the fault of the book, but more likely
due to the fact that I was reading it in spurts of 15-20 minutes a
night while sitting outside keeping an eye on over-active campers.)

Dan -- Some of her anthologies are so torn up, all that is left are
the covers with one or two stories inside and a rubberband holding the
whole mess together.  Sometimes she simply Xs stories out, sometimes
she removes them entirely.
  

    
Michelle-I know what you mean about bandmates.  We have had a hell of
time finding a new drummer that is sober/functional.  I know that that
is not entirely uncommon, but I never thought I'd actually be LIVING
Spinal Tap.  I'll be at the hollywood signing, btw.  

Len--you dang new yorkers with your "no driver's licences."  hee hee. 
looks like i'll be in town at the beginning of June for Tick previews.
 heard any buzz?

DanGuy--i am proud to say that i am living in an honest to god
SUCCESSFUL Lloyd Dobler/Diane Court relationship, and it rocks.  my
life really feels like a great Cameron Crowe movie.

-adriana, who at some point in the post degraded to no capitalization.
  

    
Today's McSweeney's concerns Norse legends, seperating "faktum" from
"fiksjon".  I found it enjoyable.  <http://www.mcsweeneys.net/>

Adriana -- Good for you.  That makes me smile. ^^  Who if you is
which, and to what degree, if you don't mind my asking?
  

    
DanGuy--I'll try to make this as short as possible.  I was 100% Diane
(dorky valedictorianish shy lilywhite repressed gurl), and David
(hubby) was 100% Lloyd (all women friends, good, beautiful soul, from
poor family and deeply cool with ugly coat).  We met in high school a
few months before graduation.  I had the almost exact same grad night
situation, where people said "You seem so nice, wish I had known you,"
etc.  Short of my dad going to jail, very similar family experiences
and expectations, and I was forbidden to see David.  David's not a
kickboxer, but he's a musician, which was equally as bad.  

VERY long story short, we had a LOT of really painful strife, but we
got through it.  And it was SO worth it.  I am actually freaking out
because I just realized that was ten years ago this month.  OH MY GOD!
  

    
I love it!  Thank you for sharing. ^^
  

    
Email from JaNell:

DanGuy-
    My grandma would probably not have had the ovaries to do something as
definite as cut out stories not up to her standard- most of her books
(very few) were about herbs or otherwise health related. My mom did black
out parts of those "your body is changing", puberty instruction type
books, as well as addendum such as "NOT until after MARRIAGE". She's not a
big reader, either, although she did get me hooked on B5. Although, she
also watches "Touched by an Angel". Go figure.
    I've been reading since I was four, average a book a day or so, and
the first book I remember the title of that I read was "Have Spacesuit,
Will Travel" and I swear I remember it being a double book with "The
Rolling Stones". Mostly I grew up fiction-wise on my older brothers'
"Conan" and "Gore" novels, which may explain a lot.

JaNell, still thrilled that she met Catherine and L. Sprague De Camp in
the elevator at WorldCon in Atlanta in 1986.
  

    
Dan - underwear... funny! I actually had a plan of attack with
underwear at one of my friend's shows. A male friends trotted up to her
daintily holding up a bra (her size, I checked) for her, and from
behing I tossed some thong panties - which not only landed on her head,
but then chose to get tangled in her hair ornaments! Okay, I should
shut up now before I give you ideas. :)

mmmmm... Cusack... It's all about the dead body in the hight school
hallway scene in GPB. :)

Oh, and Martha - I've been asked to please give you a thwack upside
the head for not posting to afn-g any more. Terje Bless misses the old
school regulars. I'm trying to get him to post here. We'll see what
happens. :)

squeaks, who must still have Martha sign the sacred shoes someday.
  

    
Justin -- right. Chesterton and London. Right.

Danguy -- PLR (Public Lending Right)is a system whereby authors are
recompensed for their books in libraries, on a pretty fair basis.

I quote from the PLR UK website... 

http://www.plr.uk.com/aboutus/aboutus.htm

"For thirty years before the passing of the 1979 Act British authors
campaigned for recognition of their right to receive payment for the
free public use of their books through the public library system. It is
possible to make a case for PLR on the basis that it provides
compensation for lost sales: a library purchases a single copy of a
book and lends it out to a hundred borrowers who might otherwise have
bought their own copies. However, it would be fairer to say that
authors feel PLR is sufficiently justified as fair reward for the
literary effort involved in bringing enjoyment and enlightenment
through their books lent out free of charge to millions of borrowers."


Erynn -- and everybody -- the photo story's up at the americangods.com
journal site.

Mary -- I agree completely about Paterson Joseph. More than anyone, he
got it.

Suzanne -- I wrote the novel of Neverwhere because I didn't really
feel that the TV series was what I had wanted it to be. I wrote the
series -- but I didn't produce it, direct it, costume it, do special
effects, or anything like that. 

There's a video called NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND which is a long
interview about Neverwhere, mostly.

The DAY I SWAPPED MY DAD FOR TWO GOLDFISH harcover's out of print;
thepaperback's still very much in print, as far as I know.

And yes, I'll be doing readings at the San Deigo and the LA stops.

Len, I'll not count on you for a ride, then.

Bill -- ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY is the photo for the books section, for
American Gods.
  

    
Apologies for blogger, which keeps eating half of the Photography
entry. 

Strangely, it worked fine, and posted fine, and then I did a couple of
tiny edits, and the whole thing went kersplooey.
  

    
Neil - Thanks for the update on the blogger. It was quite interesting
to hear about the trials of author photography. Now I'm really looking
forward to the EW spread.

Everyone - I just reserved my spot for the NYC reading Neil mentioned
in his journal. Anyone else planning to attend?
  

    
JaNell -- Well, she introduced you to B5 so she gets major props for
that, as well as the whole giving birth to you thing, I suppose.

squeaks -- GPB was a wonderful return to the John Cusack of
yesteryear, only matured.  I could definitely see Hoops McCann, Bryce,
or Lloyd Dobbler having grown up to be Martin Blank.

Neil -- Thanks.  That makes a great deal of sense.
     I must find a copy of LOTUS this weekend so I can witness the
infamous hassidic terrorist.
     The Hair Police sound like very entertaining hairdressers.
     The hair story was lovely.  I can't imagine enduring all of that
sand and smoke and such.  The more I learn of what is involved in being
a successful writer, beyond simply writing, the more grateful I am
that some many put up with it.


DanGuy,
who wonders if "the infamous hassidic terrorist" will be someone's new
pseud.
  

    
Email from dianna:

Martha - You're welcome.

Neil - Happy to know that you will keep telling stories until you are old.
Can't imagine you being crabby though :) Yay for the photo story. Is there
any hope of a signing tour in Oz? i've asked all the good bookstores in
Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Hobart - surely someone has pestered the
publishers.

Mary - Thanks :)

Michelle - Your track rocks :)

Does anyone know if Lioness is OK? Just wondering - she hasn't posted
since her op...

dianna
  

    
Neil-- Re: photography story- "what a kipper must feel like at the
precise moment it stops being a herring"  Oh my god.. that's funny. 
Thanks for finally posting the story.. it was worth the wait.  In you
honor, I have decided to let my chest hair grow until the readings. 
Possibly even after.

I'm certainly going to the Bottom Line reading and the one in
Huntington, to which I'm going to try to bring some of my students.  If
I show up at all three readings will you consider that creepy?

[When the musical _Bed and Sofa_ opened in NY I went to see it three
nights in a row.. the composer, Polly Pen, got used to seeing me there.
 The last night I was comped in; she approached me-- I thought it was
to scream at me and accuse me of being a creep, and I readied myself to
protest that I was not, in fact, a stalker.  No need-- I was just
sitting in her ticketed seat.]

Btw-- major, if belated, kudos for your response to the psychic
gatorade question.  I still have a couple of things in mind, but I'll
bring sweeties for the line too, and your generous response confirms
you as an utter mensch.

Re: The Bottom Line:the June lineup is great-- I may go to see the
Bobs, hide under a table until David Johansen plays, then hide again
until your show.

Jade-- I'd be delighted to link up with you for any or all of the
readings.  The more the merrier.  (or, with regards to the number of
days it took Neil to finish American Gods, the more, the hairier.)

Adriana-- will you be in town for the readings as well as for Tick?  I
haven't heard any buzz yet, but I've been a bit out of the loop... I
may go to big musical theatre-type party tonight, in which case I'll
let you know.
  

    
Email from JaNell:

Neil- 
I saw your picture on the home page of AGJ, and I must say, your
hair looks even crankier than before. Perhaps it liked being long? Or was
it choking from the smoke?  
JaNell
  

    
Michelle - underwear always seems to make for good stories. I had a
bunch of friends over once and one of them had decided that my
underwear was boring and showed up with fabric paints and potatoes
(which were carved into stamps). I thought she was kidding until i came
out of the kitchen to find she had raided my drawers and people were
merrily having an art party with my tighty whities.

Neil - *great chuckles* Thanks for sharing the story. Maybe when
neilgaiman.com goes up you'll post some of the Neil on fire shots.

Len - good for you for letting your chest hair grow. *grin* As much as
that may be a joke, I actually have something like five benighted
chest hairs on each side that I *do* shave from time to time... just
because they look so pathetic and lonely there.

Dan
(who has probably wandered into the land of Toomuchinformation today)
  

    
Oh geez, 26 posts since I was last on...

Len- I don't have a drivers license either and I'm almost 23. I
thought I was the only person in America of my age (or older) not to
have one. I feel slightly better now. 

DanGuy- "say anything" is one of my favorites as well. In fact, a
couple of weeks ago my husband and I went to the video store and rented
all of Cameron Crowe's movies. We had a Cameron Crowe party. His new
one Vanilla Sky should be interesting. I have no idea what it's about,
but it has Tom Cruise. Strange. 

Neil- Thanks for the story! (I know I've been annoying bugging you
about it for a while...but, you know....) I literally fell out of my
chair laughing a couple of times. I do like the picture, though...even
if your hair is on fire.(It gives off the impression that your brain is
literally burning with ideas, stories and passion) I honestly think
it's one of your best. Next to the one with you and the iguana with the
Sambrero (sp?) You do tend to look bored and/or disgusted in a lot of
pictures. But I think that's almost every author photo. Writers aren't
supposed to be models anyway, are they?

Michelle-  I hope everything goes okay with the band situation. Jess
(My husband) and his ex-band had a lot of problems so he left. You'd
probably be better off looking for people who are more proffesional and
serious and stable anyway. Don't waste your talent waiting for someone
to get their shit together. Because a lot of times that never happens.
I will definatly do the cat-nip thing. I am also moving into a new
place that has a balcony!!! Weeee! Lot's of plants! I will become
Martha Stuart! Okay....I won't do *that*.

Dan- Drink lots of beer and whiskey. Then they won't be lonely 
anymore.

Suzanne- I know that Borders everywhere else have Neil. The one here
is just fucked up. Although, I talked to a friend who works there last
night and she said they're starting to get more of him. (I don't see
how any bookstores anywhere could not have him chain or not. He's the
best damn modern writer and will sell. HELLO000!!) The Cleve is just
not a place for books, I think. It's more about sports (even though our
teams suck) and music.  

God, what a week it's been. We spontaneously decided to move this
month to escape our roommate George. He's my best friend and I love
him...but he's the roommate from hell. So, we got a nice cozy place in
Little Italy down the street. We will be living right above Mama Santas
(a restaurant where my husband cooks) and A huge, delicious bakery!
I'm so exited, but stressed as well. We have to be out of here by the
end of the month! Ahhhh! I'm going over there this weekend to paint and
varnish stuff. Tonight, I must start packing and make a "to do" list.
Argh. The boring part. I can't wait until I get to paint. Then I'll be
having Mary Poppins fun! I love painting! Weee!
  

    
Blogger seems determined to drive me mad. Today's entry sits
unpublished in some kind of limbo, while I notice that the photo story
has mostly vanished again, so the next time I try and publish an entry
I'll have to try and fix that one as well... sigh...

Here's today:

......

Got my hair cut by the wonderful Wendy from Hair Police (particularly
wonderful as she didn't grumble that I was almost half an hour late),
then stopped in to say hello to Greg Ketter at Dreamhaven Books, to
discuss the new series of spoken word CDs. (Regular readers of this
journal will have noticed me recording the material for the first two
CDs last week.) We were trying to figureout how long it would be before
they could be released, and it's going to be a little while --
probably not till the end of the year. Greg mentioned how frustrating
it is that Warning: Contains Language now goes for $100 on e-bay, and I
said "Well, could we just print up a few to tide us over until we can
get the new ones out...?" 

Greg made a phone call. "We can have some in two weeks," he said,
mildly astonished. So we're doing a small print run -- about a thousand
copies -- of Warning. It's a double CD, and I hope it will be for sale
at the various stops on the signing tour, and through DreamHaven. I
don't know if Greg's doing enough that he'll be offering it through
Amazon.com, or into the comic stores through Diamond. We'll see. 

But you will be able to get copies, for a little while. And then after
that the CDs on there will become part of the new Audio CD series. 

So that's news. 

And yesterday I got an e-mail from my agent saying that Harper have
just bought the electronic book rights to American Gods (no advance.
The e-retailer takes half, and Harper and I split the remaining half).
And then they asked if they could do the rest of the books in the same
way, and we said yes. 

(That's not really news. But it's interesting.) 

And I got home to find an e-mail telling me that it's been announced
that David Goyer is adapting and directing a movie based on my short
story Murder Mysteries for Dimension films -- something that's been in
the works for several years, and has just come to fruition. 

I wish David much luck.... (Thinks: I hope they do Private Eye Angel
toys.) 

And that's all the news for this afternoon.

.........

Dianna -- the stores will have to tell the publisher - Hodder
Australia I guess... 

Len -- won't consider it creepy at all.

Dan -- i don't think you'll ever see the Hair On Fire shots, because
we'd have to pay Sigrid the photographer reproduction rights. I'll try
and have them at one of the sigings, though...

Erynn -- well, the iguana shot was one of those moments when, getting
off a cruise ship, they stick an iguana in your face and take a photo
of you. The idea is that you can buy the shot (or not) when you get
back to the ship.

I was rather surprised, on getting back to the ship, to discover that
fans had already bought the photo...
  

    
Neil: congratulations on the Murder Mysteries film.  I think that story
is on its way to becoming a root meme in contemporary fantasy. (Leaving
aside all of the Vertigo comics stuff that draws on it, I'd guess it   
also exerted its influence on Kevin Smith's "Dogma.")
  

    
Neil - Wow! Thanks for the heads up. Now I can order Warning again and
actually stay stationary long enough to receive it!

Erynn - I don't think I want to encourage the little buggers to breed.
I've yet to date a woman who actually liked hairy chests.. so I'll
keep the whiskey drinking to a minimum.

On Murder Mysteries - Before we had settled on the final theme for
this latest show, we were working off of a premise that each piece
would be based on One versus... something. I wanted a theological piece
in there, and came up with a really interesting Lucifer story (One
versus God, who else but Lucifer had even a fighting chance?)... but
then felt like it was entirely too derivative of stuff that Neil and
Garth Ennis and others have done. I think it'll be hard to write a
story about a Miltonian Lucifier without it feeling "done before and
better"... at least for a good long time.
  

    
Neil - (1236) a propos of nothing, I can usually hear people's voices
speaking their written words if I'm familiar with their voices, but I
just can't hear you saying "kersplooey"...

DanGuy - I've been hearing stories of Hair Police (I know too many
people from Minneapolis out here) for years now. Next time I'm out
there I may wander in just so I can see people and places I've been
hearing so (and sometimes 'too') much about.

Dianna - thank you!

Dan - I suddenly want to put a lock on my underwear drawer for the
muppet madness party next weekend... just in case.

Neil - Good to hear of other peoples' odd photo shoots. Thank you for
sharing! :) Although I feel oddly compelled to email my photographers
about sand... just in case. Eek, and I thought I was burning from the
100+ degree heat (not including studio lights!). Maybe I was just
burning from the inside from the cigarette smoke (the photographer
picks the only non-smoking model he's got for the smoking shots...
huh?)

And super congrats on the Murder Mysteries movie! Good to see such a
great story get so much attention. :)

squeaks, who is too big a prude to do a naked shoot, wings or no...
  

    
I'm wearing black today. Not the usual black of my gothic nature...but
the black of mourning. 

According to the BBC (http://news.bbc.co.uk), Douglas Adams, who wrote
"The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy," died Friday morning of a
heart attack. He was 49. I met Mr. Adams once during a tour for his
nonfiction nature book, and I found him to be a wonderfully warm and
witty fellow.
  

    
Oh my goodness...  That's tragic.  He can't be dead, he can't be.

...

Erynn -- I liked "Almost Famous".  We'll see about "Vanilla Sky".

Neil -- How is the e-publishing split compared to print?  If you're
taking home a fourth, I suppose that's more?  (Though I suppose the
bottom line also depends on how much Harper charges for e-books.)
     I've never quite forgiven Goyer for the second Crow movie, though
I appreciate his efforts and those of the rest of the crew a bit more
after reading the book on the production (they did things such as: the
graffiti on the walls operated like a Greek chorus, only they wrote it
all in their own tagging font so viewers couldn't really read it
without freeze-framing the movie and then translating it with the
alphabet cipher contained in the book).  I liked "Dark City", though. 
So I too wish him luck.

I've got another big weekend of yard work and terraforming planned,
I'd better go get started before the sun gets too high.
  

    
I want to say something eloquent about the passing of Mr. Adams.  I
want to say something that clarifies how big a loss I think this is.  I
want to say something that will make people nod and say "yes, that's
it exactly".  But all I can think to say, is that this really, really
sucks.

Jen.