Neil Gaiman, talked to Jian Ghomeshi of CBC Radio One’s Q on a recent broadcast/podcast. They chatted about The Graveyard Book‘s new Newberry Award designation, the new film version of Coraline, and why scary stories aren’t bad for kids. Have a listen |MP3|.
Podcast feed:
http://www.cbc.ca/podcasting/includes/andthewinneris.xml
Posted by Jesse Willis
P.S. Hey CBC! Why wont you FREE Apocalypse Al?
The SFFaudio Podcast #017 – Brian Murphy of The Silver Key blog joins the podcast and talks to us about his terrific blog, writing habits, and how vikings and rappers are alike.
Talked about on today’s show:
Seamus Heaney’s Beowulf, Michael D.C. Drout‘s Beowulf, Neil Gaiman‘s Beowulf, religion in fiction, god in fiction, Stephen King, Carrie, The Stand, Desperation, The Regulators, Kate Nelligan, Delores Claiborne, Cujo, The Tommyknockers, On Writing, Duma Key, The Dark Tower, George R.R. Martin, A Song Of Ice And Fire, Roy Dotrice, Pandora Star, Peter F. Hamilton, Audiofile magazine, how being a truck driver is worse than being in prison (without audiobooks), Mini-Masterpieces of Science Fiction edited by Allan Kaster, Fantasy, Brandon Sanderson, Robert Jordan, The Wheel Of Time, Robert E. Howard, J.R.R. Tolkien, my fantasy fiction rant, “fantasy fiction works best when magic is talked about but rarely seen”, The Cimmerian blog, Mark Finn’s Blood And Thunder, Michael Chabon, The Yiddish Policeman’s Union, Gentlemen Of The Road, Henry Treece, The Viking Trilogy: Viking’s Dawn, The Road To Mikligaard, Viking’s Sunset, Bernard Cornwell, Saxon Stories: The Last Kingdom, Michael Shaara, The Killer Angels, William Gibson, Neuromancer, The Dark Worlds Of H.P. Lovecraft, Wayne June, horror movie: Session 9.
Posted by Jesse Willis
Back before recording technologies like the rotating wax cylinder, reel to reel, and the Sony minidisc people used to practice the art of audiobook without actually recording it. They called it “reading aloud” – for kicks I’ve been practicing this archaic art for years. Most often I like to do it with a group, in which people take turns reading from the pages of the paperbook, either page by page, character by character, or chapter by chapter.
From left to right in the top row, holding their first edition, first printing, hardcovers of Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book are:
Matt, T.K., Erica, Sue and Jenny!
To be quite fair, these little rotters didn’t really think much of the book when they first started reading it (at home alone). But when in class I read aloud the section in which the ghouls describe their favourite drink (the ooze that accumulates at the bottom of lead lined coffins) a round robin of “Ewwww!”, “Disgusting!”, and “Grosss!” was followed by a growing appreciation of the book and a commitment to reading it in class as well as at home. We finished The Graveyard Book a week or two back, and now our current book is Coraline – with a mix of library paperback, library hardback and new movie tie-in editions. After Coraline we’ll have to figure out which book to do next. Anybody have any suggestions?
Posted by Jesse Willis
The Graveyard Book
By Neil Gaiman; Read by Neil Gaiman
Audible Download – Approx. 8 Hours[UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Harper Audio
Published: 2008
Themes: / Fantasy / Ghosts / Childhood / Revenge / Parenting / Afterlife / Humor / YA /
In a few words: Not as disturbing as Coraline (which is… a bit) and every ounce as entertaining as I hoped.
Now, details: The Graveyard Book is Neil Gaiman’s latest YA novel. The story is about Nobody Owens, a young boy who starts the novel as a toddler that ends up in a graveyard late at night, all by himself. I’ll let Gaiman tell you how that happens, because the journey is all the fun here. Nobody Owens grows up, and Gaiman’s ghosts do all the parenting.
Again, Gaiman manages to be both sinister and funny at the same time, like he’s telling you the worst thing you’ve ever heard, but with a smile and a wink. Here’s the first lines of Chapter 1:
There was a hand in the darkness, and it held a knife. The knife had a handle of polished black gold, and a blade finer and sharper than any razor. If it sliced you, you may not even know you had been cut. Not immediately.
You’d think what follows would be a bit grisly, and I suppose it is, but it’s all so fantastic that I smiled through most of that chapter, with the sort of glow I get around Halloween. A pair of ghosts (the Owens’s) raising a live boy, that boy growing up and learning his letters off gravestones and his life’s philosophy from the perspective of dead but well-meaning people; well, it’s just a great idea, and it’s perfectly presented by Gaiman. My kids love it too. This is the kind of book that will be revisited in my house often. In addition, I’d say that if you have a Harry Potter fan on your Christmas list, this book might be just the right fit, and it has the added bonus of introducing him or her to the likes of Neil Gaiman, which in turn could open that fan up to the rest of the world of books as well.
Gaiman also narrates, and like I’ve said elsewhere, he’s one of the few authors I’ve heard that could make a comfortable living as an audiobook narrator. I can’t imagine this audiobook being read by someone else, and I’m very happy that it isn’t.
Edited to add the SFFaudio Essential, which was forgotten by the reviewer. He has been sacked.
Posted by Scott D. Danielson
Some lagniappe (a little extra sample), from Gaiman and Pratchett’s Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnus Nutter, Witch is the latest offering over at Forgotten Classics.
Get the MP3 |HERE|, or subscribe to the feed |HERE|!
Posted by Scott D. Danielson
The SFFaudio Podcast #007 is so lucky! We’re super hoop-jumping, in this deadly to DRM show – we’re unspooling fences and digging ditches – working around the work-arounds – so, the long and the short:
Scott: Argument is an intellectual process. Contradiction is just the automatic gainsaying of any statement the other person makes.
Jesse: No it isn’t.
Topics discussed include:
Golden Age Comic Book Stories, Argosy magazine covers, Pellucidar, At The Earth’s Core, Edgar Rice Burroughs, LibriVox, A Princess Of Mars, multiple narrators, Ender’s Game, Stephen King, The Dark Tower, Frank Muller, George Guidall, Criminal Minds, Peter Coyote, Isaac Asimov, The Foundation Trilogy, more new LibriVox titles, The Castle of Otranto, Horace Walpole, The Last Man, Mary Shelley, The Wood Beyond the World, William Morris, Cori Samuel, On The Beach, Nevil Shute, The 2nd SFFaudio Challenge, Julie D., A House-Boat On The Styx, John Kendrick Bangs, Mur Lafferty, Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman, public libraries, NetLibrary.net, Recorded Books, DRM, overdrive.com, Bill C-61, blank media and iPod levies, what makes DRM evil, Blackstone Audio‘s solution, MP3-CD players, the proper settings for blog RSS feeds, “people will never pay for something they can get for free”, donation models, the Liaden book model, Sharon Lee and Steve Miller.
Posted by Jesse Willis