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Editor’s notes: Three things

 

Marvel has made available a podcast in three parts with Joe Quesada and Neil discussing the Eternals:

Telstra/BigPond have made available streaming video from the Sydney Writers Festival. Click on the May 24th Meet the Writers presentation with Neil and Jonathan Stroud, or the May 25th Graphic Books presentation.

If anyone is archiving any of these resources, or has audio of the Wil Anderson interview, please e-mail.

Eternals

Besides running an interview with Neil about the Eternals project, Newsarama has run a series of articles to bring those who do not know of the past history of the characters up to date:

Newsarama also has images from Jack Kirby’s Eternals story “The Day of the Gods” available. One of Marvel’s news releases mentioned that the entire Kirby story would be available as a digital comic, but it does not appear to be yet – however, the Eternals Sketchbook by John Romita Jr. has been posted.

First looks at the comic are available from Newsarama (which is the only one appearing to have lettered pages), IGN, CBR, and Marvel (with information on variants). Marvel also has cover images and summaries for Issue 2 and Issue 3 available.

CBR has posted an interview with John Romita Jr. on the project.

And Marvel Spotlight #7, which will be released as the same time as the Eternals on June 21st will feature an feature length interview with Neil.

Clippings

CBR’s coverage of the Vertigo panel at Wizard World Philadelphia includes discussion and images from Absolute Sandman.

The 4th June Independent reviews Anansi Boys and Mirrormask; there is a brief Mirrormask review in the Birmingham Evening Mail.

The May 28th Denver Post mentions that Neil has a contribution in Polder: A Festschrift for John Clute and Judith Clute, edited by Farah Mendlesohn.

Fangoria notes that there will be a story by Neil in Shrouded by Darkness: Tales of Terror, due out in Winter 2006. Royalties from sales of the book go to DebRA, a charity working on behalf of people with the genetic skin blistering condition, Epidermolysis Bullosa (EB).

From the May 15th Kirkus Reviews:

The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories. Susanna Clarke. Bloomsbury USA. October 2006. 1-59691-251-0. $23.95.

“I’m thrilled that she’s finally collecting her stories,” says Gaiman. “I love the idea of them being rescued from obscurity and read.”
* BONUS FACT
Clarke’s previous jobs include teaching English in Turin to stressed-out Fiat motor-company executives and editing cookbooks at Simon &, Schuster’s Cambridge office.

For many years, the only way to experience the magic of Susanna Clarke’s writing was through her rich, unconventional–and hard-to-find–short stories. That was before the success of Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, her ambitious bestselling novel of dueling 18th-century British magicians.

Now Bloomsbury has gathered seven of Clarke’s marvelous stories in a new collection. The title story, passed from a writing teacher to fellow author Neil Gaiman, launched Clarke’s publishing career.

“I was lucky, because I didn’t actually have to go and hunt for the short stories–Susanna would send them to me,” Gaiman recalls. “One would arrive every few years, these absolutely magical stories, like tiny, dangerous journeys to fairy land.”

Other Clarke fairy tales, some of which involve the England of Strange and Norrell, include “Mr. Simonelli or The Fairy Widower,” which was shortlisted for a World Fantasy Award, and “The Duke of Wellington Misplaces His Horse,” a story from the world of Gaiman’s Stardust personally selected by him for A Fall of Stardust.

From the May 15th Library Journal:

The 101 Best Graphic Novels, rev. ed. 2006. Stephen Weiner. NBM Publishing. 80p. January 2006. ISBN 1-56163-443-3. $15.95.

This is a revised second edition of a guide first published in 2001, which was itself an update of Weiner’s 100 Graphic Novels for Public Libraries (1996). Along with the foreword by Neil Gaiman, it retains from the earlier editions many classics such as A Contract with God and Bone. But over half of the listings here are new, including highly acclaimed recent works like Blankets and Epileptic and also a dozen added manga, including Lone Wolf & Cub and Barefoot Gen. Other entries range from superheroes (Ultimate Spider-Man) to nonfiction (The Cartoon History of the Universe). For each book, Weiner provides a black-and-white illustration of the cover, a suggested age rating, and a brief review. The focus is on books currently available (though The Greatest Team-Up Stories Ever Told seems to have gone out of print). For this edition, Weiner has left out newspaper strip collections (except for, oddly, Classic Star Wars) and expanded his listing of recommended books about comics. This is an improvement over previous editions; no two readers would agree on the contents, but this is a recommended collection development tool for libraries and a nice guide for the general public as well.
–Steve Raiteri

Anansi Boys was also included, along with books by Virginia Hamilton, Lawrence Yep, and Isabel Allende, in ALA Booklist’s Core Collection of Young Adult titles in Fantasy and Science Fiction that incorporate multicultural literature and diversity issues.

Stories about Balticon appeared in the May 25th and May 26th issues of the Baltimore Sun.

The Savannah Actors Theatre is planning on adapting Neverwhere to the stage – details may appear on their LiveJournal as well.

Coverage of the Stardust filming continues in the UK (specifically, Elm Hill) in the Norfolk Eastern Daily Press (which has a photo of “The Slaughtered Prince Inn”) and the Norwich Evening News.

Also, from the 20th May Irish Independent:

 …Actor David Kelly (77) believes the word retirement is obscene. “You don’t retire, for Christ’s sake! All those people with their three cars and four houses in Spain who work at a job they hate until they’re 60and then they go on a world cruise and come home and have a heart attack… I have no intention of doing that. They’ll have to take me out and shoot me.”

He laughs: “It’s lovely to be playing a part that I’m too young for. That’s never happened before.”…

He is currently shooting a major new film, Stardust, in the English Cotswolds along with a glittering cast which includes Robert De Niro, Michelle Pfieffer, Peter O’Toole, Sienna Miller and Ricky Gervais.

Most of the big names have – like himself – cameo roles. “It’s a very beautiful fantasy about guarding a wall through which there is another world. I’m the guard at the wall. I’m 90-something years old at the beginning and I get older as the film goes on.”

and from the 12th May Gloucestershire Echo:

Bibury is set to hit the big time as film crews descend on the Cotswolds village.

The cottages were converted from a sheep house in 1600 for weavers who supplied cloth to Arlington Mill.

National Trust homes in Arlington Row will feature in a blockbuster called Stardust, starring Robert De Niro and Michelle Pfeiffer.

The film is a fantasy set in a make-believe, magical land.

Cameras rolled at the picturesque 14th century terrace of Cotswold stone cottages overlooking the river.

The homes are a huge tourist attraction and one of the area’s most photographed scenes.

But they were given the old-fashioned treatment with props including milk churns and sacks of grain.

TV aerials, modern guttering, signs and paving were disguised for the film, which is believed to be set in the 1890s.

Gallery owner Diane Breen said: “They have put in an amazing amount of work.

“There’s even a fake door that slots in front of one of the National Trust doors which makes it look even older.”

Bibury Trout Farm manager Ian Peters was out with his camera.

“We didn’t see any of the stars but we’ll be waiting with bated breath to see the film,” he said.

“They were here for three days and used our car park. They had snow on the cottages’ rooftops and filmed a lot at night. It was dramatic.

“People didn’t do much business because of all the film crew vehicles – there must have been about 100.”

 

  • Anyone who is subscribing to the Del.icio.us account or feed will have already seen these links, as that tends to get updated first. Hopefully the tags will act as indexing terms, allowing users to search there more efficiently as well.
  • Anyone who would like to submit convention reports from Balticon, please e-mail lucy_anne AT verizon DOT net (yes, that’s a new contact). Even a link to weblog entries would be lovely.
  • And finally, I apologize for the lack of Eternals links here previously; despite the fact that I cut my teeth searching the Internet for comics-related news, I’ve moved over to using search engines that I have recently found out do not pick up on a majority of the websites covering that subject. Which proves you can never assume that the tools in your toolbox are applicable for every occasion.

Audio and Video Interviews

Besides the ABC Queensland interview, there is an interview from ABC’s Triple J radio.

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