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Anansi Boys “Best of the Year” Listings:

And Overbooked notes it should be on the shortlist for SF Gate’s Best Speculative Fiction, but I’m not finding that online.

And remember that you have until February 10, 2005 to vote in your favorite books of the year for SFSite’s Readers Choice Awards. Just email your list up to 10 of your favorite “speculative fiction” books released during the 2005 calendar year in ranked order to vote2005@sfsite.com with the word VOTE in the subject line. More information about the Readers Choice Awards can be found at http://www.sfsite.com/columns/neil214.htm

Clippings:

DC Comics notes that there will be a Deadman story written by Neil in Solo #8, on sale December 28th.

Anansi Boys is recommended as a gift book for the holidays in the December 4th Grand Rapids Press, by Michael Berry in the November 20th San Francisco Chronicle, and by Teresa K. Weaver in the Fall Gift Guide in the November 13th Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The audiobook is recommended for the holidays by Rochelle O’Gorman in the December 18th Hartford Courant

John Griffin recommends the audiobook of Anansi Boys in the December 18th San Antonio Express-News:

…For sheer entertainment, it’s hard to beat Neil Gaiman’s fantastical Anansi Boys. Perhaps the breeziest bit of storytelling all year, this novel concerns the twin sons of the African spider god, Anansi.

One boy, Charlie, is trying to lead a normal life in England, but his father’s practical jokes, including nicknaming his son “Fat Charlie,” seem to get in the way. But with Dad’s death, everything turns topsy-turvy, leading Charlie on an adventure that is anything but normal.

Lenny Henry’s island accent gives this rollicking tale a light, musical lilt that makes it even more intoxicating.

Information Today’s Deborah Poulson recommended Good Omens as her holiday read:

Possibly the funniest book ever about the Armageddon. Characters include angels, demons, the Them, a dog named Dog, and Apocalyptic Horsepersons. Find out why the cosmic battle of good and evil isn’t so much a chess match as really complicated solitaire.

In the December 14th New Zealand Herald, David Larsen picked the Mirromask scriptbook as his ‘Christmas read’, saying:

…this isn’t a book-of-the-film as such. Gaiman and artist Dave McKean have reworked the story from the ground up, producing a sumptuous picture book, almost a graphic novel. A girl falls into a fantasy world and has to earn the right to return to the life she used to dislike. Gorgeous.

There are a number of new reviews of the McSweeney short story collection Noisy Outlaws….

From Michael Knoop’s review in the December 25th San Antonio Express News:

…Most of the stories are light in tone, but two of the better tales are decidedly darker. Neil Gaiman’s Sunbird tells of a group of zealous gourmands who think they have tasted everything until set on a quest for the titular fowl. Those familiar with Gaiman will recognize his heady blend of mythology and language. Monster relates a summer campout gone incredibly wrong. Kelly Link’s refusal to follow any pat story conventions results in a genuinely disturbing horror story.

and from Denise Hamilton’s review in the December 18th Los Angeles Times:

…Gaiman (of The Sandman graphic novel fame) provides an exquisite take on the mythical phoenix – this time rising from the ashes of gastronomical greed – in his baroque Sunbird.

From the December 4th Minneapolis Star Tribune holiday gift book guide by Sarah T. Williams:

Edgar Allan Poe: Selected Poems and Tales, illustrated by Mark Summers (Barnes & Noble, 244 pages, $14.94).
Poe’s stories “cry out” to be illustrated, graphic artist and novelist Neil Gaiman says in his introduction to this collection. “They contain central and primary images, blasts of color, and maddening shapes. … ” Many a fertile mind has needed no assistance in conjuring scenes from Poe’s timeless tinglers. But that doesn’t detract from the pleasure of seeing Summers execute his imagination on the page with bold scratchboard and ghostly charcoal illustrations that evoke the horror, creepiness, melancholy and malevolence of the poems and tales.

From Tom Easton “Reference Library” column in the October 2005 Analog:

The latest in the University of Nebraska’s Bison Books series is Jayme Lynn Blaschke’s Voices of Vision. Over the last few years, Blaschke has interviewed seventeen editors (including our own Stanley Schmidt), novelists (Robin Hobb, Patricia Anthony, Charles de Lint, and Elizabeth Moon), comic book creators (including Neil Gaiman), and Old Masters (Samuel R. Delaney, Gene Wolfe, Harlan Ellison, and Jack Williamson). Those interviews are here assembled for your edification.

[Ed. note: The piece included looks like it is a reprint of the long interview from 2002 p
osted at RevolutionSF, but ‘search inside the book’ is no way foolproof – la]

From Susan Stan’s review of Books and Boundaries in the Summer 2004 Children’s Literature Association Quarterly:

…This volume contains the proceedings of [a day-long annual conference held at Roehampton Institute in London], held on November 15,2003 and co-sponsored by the British section of IBBY and the National Centre for Research in Children’s Literature (NCRCL).

In this printed collection, fifteen papers join talks by authors and publishers, reorganized from their place on the conference schedule into three catch-all sections. The majority of the papers are by writers who have some affiliation with the University of Surrey Roehampton, either as current or past students in the master’s or doctoral program or as faculty members. The informal talks that frame the collection of papers add the insights of authors, publishers, critics, and a lone bookseller…

…Six authors, including Penelope Lively, Ann Thwaite, Theresa Breslin, Linda Newbery, Elizabeth Laird, and Neil Gaiman, were also present at the conference. The length and form of their remarks presented here varies widely, depending, it seems, on whether each spoke from a prepared script or from notes. For instance, Neil Gaiman’s closing plenary talk appears to have been off-the-cuff rather than written in advance, and the six short paragraphs he reconstructed for this volume are insufficient. A tantalizing headline leading into this section reads, “Neil Gaiman saw his brief as talking about how he became a ‘crossover author'” but in fact he is addressing more the why than the how as he reveals his hopes and dreams for the children’s books he writes. Pinsent writes in the introduction that “Gaiman remarked when trying to recall what he had said in the plenary session which brought the conference to a close: “I wish I’d been listening to what I was saying!'” Conference proceedings are useful, but being there is better.

From the December 7th Manilla Standard:
… Rom Villaseran’s ‘lunar fantasy’

If the Man on the Moon would take an earthly name, perhaps it would be “Rom Villaseran.”

After dining with dream-weaver Neil Gaiman as a prize for winning first place in the Neil Gaiman Art Contest, Villeseran has somehow taken a piece of the American novelist with him as he launched “Paalam Sa Buwan” – his first solo exhibition displaying nine whimsical murals [at LRI Business Plaza on Nicanor Garcia Street]…

…Widely known for designing rock album covers and fantasy-inspired artworks, Villaseran’s collection is predominantly rendered in neutral colors. His abstract paintings are neatly spread on canvas, while his other murals possess the combined powers of still life and illusion.”
–Deni Rose M. Afinidad