Clippings
Happy Halloween!
From the October 30th Montgomery Advertiser, Blu Gilliand reports the following:
Hill House Publishers is a small specialty book-publishing company specializing in works of horror and the supernatural (their name is a reference to the famous Shirley Jackson novel, ‘The Haunting of Hill House’). The company, which has previously released limited editions of Peter Straub’s ‘Ghost Story’ and the horror anthology ‘999,’ is tackling their biggest project to date with a series of editions from author Neil Gaiman.
First up will be Gaiman’s most recent novel, American Gods. The signed, numbered edition (there will only be 750 copies) will feature more than 40 pages of material not included in the mainstream release, and will sell for $200. Hill House will follow this release with similar editions of Gaiman’s Neverwhere, Stardust, Smoke and Mirrors, and Coraline.
The company is offering a subscription to what they are calling the ‘Neil Gaiman’s Preferred Author’s Editions’ series, which guarantees the opportunity to buy every book in the series, as well as a copy of a screenplay (titled, appropriately enough, ‘A Screenplay’) by Gaiman in hardcover form. There are only 500 slots in this series, and you have to pre-order (and pre-pay for) both ‘American Gods’ and ‘Neverwhere’ to get in. Obviously, this offer is for serious collectors only, but it looks and sounds like these will be nice editions for those who can afford them.
What the reporter does not mention is that the screenplay is based on a project undertaken with another well known author, and was written in the early 90s. Which should be enough for most of the people reading this page to make an educated guess as to what it is, and why it’s titleless.
(And no, I’m not going to be more clear than that, because if I’m wrong, I will feel like a complete twit)
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From the 31st October Guardian:
Little things we like: Don’t Panic – Douglas Adams and the Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Neil Gaiman
Anyone interested in the curse of creativity, or in the correct use of towels during an interstellar emergency, will gain from this book. It gives you hope to learn that behind the brilliant HHG was a man who found writing about as easy as playing snooker with a bit of rope. “All you have to do,” said Adams, “is stare at a piece of blank paper until your forehead bleeds.”
His deadline avoidance system was legendary, and included “six months of baths and peanutbutter sandwiches”. As for getting the thing made for radio, producer Geoffrey Perkins vaguely remembers “a blur of lunches”; someone else remembers “total wankoff”. But HHG was a deserved, extraordinary success, and this updated edition of the biography by comic-book writer Neil Gaiman (with which Adams co-operated) now extends to his death in 2001 and his work after HHG.
–Pascal Wyse
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One of the fun things about the Google News Alerts is that it finds sites you would might never run into during your day to day web browsing.
Such as SFCrowsnest, which reviews both Endless Nights and the new issue of the Datlow/Windling Year’s Best Fantasy And Horror in their November issue.