# of queries read this week: 272
# of partials/manuscripts requested: 0
genre of partials/manuscripts requested: n/a


A lot of people have good luck rituals. Lucky ties, shirts, jewelery, etc. Throwing salt over their shoulder. Not stepping on cracks. And so on. Many people believe that Friday the 13th is unlucky. For me, however, this day seems auspicious: it's the first time my query folder has been under 200 since early April (pre London Book Fair). On the other hand, I can remember a time that I used to be surprised that it got over 100.

On this day, Friday the 13th, I bring you some query letter superstitions:

* What time of year a query is sent makes a difference.
* A random sampling of people liking the book guarantees it will sell widely.
* Spell-checking and proof-reading are done by copy-editors and therefore the manuscript doesn't need that beforehand.
* Arguing with a rejection will change the agent's mind.
* Sending the same exact query 3 weeks later will get a different reply.
* In the same vein, repeat queries over the course of many months will wear an agent down until they agree to representation.
* Agents never remember who they meet and what they've requested, so it's okay to lie about that. This is particularly successful if referencing a conference the agent has never attended.
* You can't get published without an agent; you can't get an agent without being published.

Some agent superstitions about queries:
* It is bad luck to read queries on vacation, on birthdays, and during the holiday season.
* Burying a query at the cross-roads means it won't come back to haunt you.
* Don't feed them after midnight or get them wet.
* They breed while you sleep. (Oh, wait. That one's true.)

What query superstitions can you think of? Or, do you do anything that smacks of ritual when you send a query out? What is it and what is it supposed to augment/prevent?

Some quick notes. I've been reading a lot of books as the Nebula season nears under its new rules. My concern is really the Andre Norton Award. I hope it will take off on its own soon, because award processes of any sort remind me too much of playground hierarchy games to get serious about them, but on the other tentacle, I promised Andre not long before she died that I would do my best to see this through. It was close to her heart--so close she'd intended her estate to go to the award . . . but there wasn't an estate.

But the generous thought was there. And when I was pimping the award to SFWA to sponsor, I went around to a whole lot of teacher, librarian, and reading-related cons to ask if such an award would do any good. In the adult fiction world, I doubt that they make much difference, but in the kidzlit world, there are the gatekeepers who buy for kids--librarians and teachers. And the result was overwhelmingly positive: "Awards get books to the front of the [ever shrinking] book buying budget." Heard that over and over. Genre books had that extra crapload of prejudice because so many librarians and teachers and administrators seem to equate fantasy with frivolous, and sf with boring.

So here I am, on the jury yet again--of course the upside is a metric butt-ton of free books. And I am a fast reader. (Except on screen. Very slow, when books compete for computer time, but I am in the process of fixing that.)

Anyway I'm seeing a trend here in this particular range of books read over the past couple of months--and wanted to throw it out there to see how others feel. Maybe it's not actually a problem, except to me, being a visual reader.

That is, the problem of the first person narrator in presenting visual cues--the narrator saying things like My lips thinned as listened to her lies. or My brown hair swept over my ears, reaching my shoulder blades. And in one example (paraphrased slightly) My eyes scorched his icy blue gaze.

So what I'm seeing is the narrator pausing the action in order to whip out the mirror . . . no, that's not right. They're not stopping the action in order to peruse themselves, but it feels like that. Like their own looks are as important as the interactions with the other characters. Yet I'm good with the narrator reporting on what they can actually see. (Jane's lips thinned as she listened to her sister's lies. or Jane's lips thinned as I spun out my lies.) But as soon as I get My lips thinned as Jane spun out her lies I've got the mental image of the narrator holding a mirror between herself and Jane. Is anyone else jostled out of the story by that?

(And I still get too-vivid mental YouTube filmclips when eyes scorch, light, blaze, glow, sear, smolder, stab, and especially glue. "Her green eyes glued to his face . . ." ouch ouch ouch)

1. VNEART WAR #2 has gone off to the editor, only a month late. It's got good bones, but it needs to spend some time in the gym and spa, if you know what I mean. Thankfully, we have a good trainer. Now I get an hour to rest, and I have to start revisions for MUSTANG. Some day I will get a whole day of nothing but writing new stuff?

2. LIbco, whoever you are, sending people to spam the "Why do Catholics" post isn't going to win you any point. Conversations are treated with dignity, trolls and spam gets deleted.

3. I am amused to note that, on the story that was rejected, the editor found the first part intriguing and well-done. I note this because that very same opening got panned by a majority of my writers group, who didn't like it at all, for many of the reasons the editor DID like it.

Listen to advice, but trust your instincts.


And now I am away, possibly for much of the weekend. Play nice, y'all!

Pitcher Dock Ellis died earlier this year. While he had many impressive achievements throughout his career, he's probably best known for having thrown a no-hitter while high on LSD and bennies. Ellis told the story years later, and No Mas has taken the audio of that revelation and provided brilliant animation and music.

Do check it out. If you don't laugh, you have no soul...

Ellis Island, New York's main immigration center, closed after 62 years, having admitted over 15 million people (1954)

THE SEVEN SINS OF ENGLAND

In May 2007, the British TV station Channel 4 aired an exploration of the "seven sins of England," to analyze the roots and endurance of "historical chavvery." These seven sins were:

BINGE DRINKING
SLAGGISHNESS
CONSUMERISM
HOOLIGANISM
VIOLENCE
RUDENESS
BIGOTRY


Happiness is a warm puppy.
Charles M. Schulz (1922-2000)

http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendId=164952151&blogId=518326064

Skin Tight (1989) by Carl HiaasenMuch the same mode of comedy-satire-thriller as the later Skinny Dip; Hiaasen may be a writer not well served by reading too many too close together.  I did get to see...

I haven't been doing much of anything except writing. I'm about 10,000 words away from finishing the YA fantasy I'm working on, so that's good. We've also got free tickets to the Texas Renaissance Festival tomorrow and I'll be taking a break to go to that.

Some interesting links:

scottedelman posted this one: WWII Classic From Here to Eternity was originally considered too gay to be published. As the nation marks another Veterans Day with gays still barred from serving openly, Kaylie Jones, daughter of From Here to Eternity author James Jones, reveals that a major gay sex storyline was cut from her father’s famed novel. Plus, view the original manuscript.

Bookends, LLC: Who Does This? Not too long ago somebody thought it would be a good idea to send an angry diatribe of an email to roughly 400 publishing professionals.

Exhibit opening & dinner tonight. Brunch tomorrow. BookViewCafe presentation tomorrow night. A bye on Sunday, thank the football gods. A business cocktail party on Monday, and a social one on Tuesday. And then Philcon, and the SFWA Reception, and then off to Boston the Wednesday after.

Eeeep?


Meanwhile, keeping to my promise to bring VINEART WAR #2 in under 110,000 words, the draft is at... 109,400. Go, me. Of course, no promises are made as to what it will look like once Mam'selle Editrix has her way with it...

High tides and the remnants of the tropical storm, plus a low front... all the makings, oh yeah. Already lost an (inexperienced) surfer to violent waves, as per this morning's news, and the wind's going to be a significant factor in getting around today.

If you're in a coastal zone, keep your boots on and your windows closed, 'k? The rest of us, stay as dry and un-buffeted as you can...



[I don't see this becoming a nor'easter of even minor legend -- unless the winds pick up significantly, it's just going to be an annoyance for most of us -- but it's not going to be fun, either)

Just a quick post to answer a few questions. First: yes, House went to Michigan first. I am charmed by the idea that, like Lex Luthor of Smallville, House was thrown out of more than one school. No, this was not a bit of carelessness we’re trying to quickly retcon after the fact – note that House says “thrown out of my first med school,” implying there was more than one. Just to make sure we were in lawful territory, when we were writing this we went back and pulled every reference to House and Cuddy’s past from every episode where it was mentioned. Mind you, sometimes mistakes can creep in because writers are used to hearing ideas that never make it to script, or reading things in scripts that never make it to air, or watching episode cuts that go on to lose scenes before the audience sees them. Those things can lodge in your mind. So we were careful to get the final transcripts – and then, in one case, corrected a reference to something that changed after the final draft was written, and hadn’t been updated in script form. Recently I heard from a couple of people who referenced a tweet I’d made, in which I “tried to explain my mistake.” So, my friends, I challenge you: if anybody can point to a line of dialogue anywhere in the show where it was stated that Hopkins came first, I will take you out to lunch personally and tell you how clever you are. While I’m as amused as anyone by our occasional tumbles from the railroad of continuity, this was not one.

(I used to wonder, actually, where the whole “Hopkins was first” thing came from, till someone told me it was once on Wikipedia. In fact, the person who told me this was an assistant at House whom I’d asked to double-check my continuity accuracy, because we were being, well, careful. When I heard this, I figured that a fan somewhere made an assumption. Since we aired the episode, I’ve also heard that the Fox site might have said so as well. I can’t confirm this personally, but if so, I can only wonder whether the Fox site got it from Wikipedia (stuff like that happens) or vice versa; such is the serpent ouroborus of TV-fan interaction in these exciting times.)

As it happens, continuity is one of my personal bugaboos. When I read a script that says, for instance, that Wilson’s second wife has a dog who’s 17 years old, I completely rebuild my mental picture of how long House and Wilson have known each other, because that is the kind of girl I am. (“But, Doris, they could always have gotten the dog when he was already old.” Me, stubborn as a toddler: “No, they couldn’t, because the dialogue says they got him as a puppy.” Thus do we get the origin story in “Birthmarks.”)

In this obsessive spirit, when we first started talking about how House and Cuddy might look back at their first meeting, I originally wanted them to have entirely dueling versions of it, a kind of Rashomon meta-joke on the occasional continuity tangles a show in its sixth season can get into. But as the scene was refined, I realized it would work better for them to have more or less the same memories, but interpret them differently. I loved the idea of House in the campus bookstore, a local legend who could mercilessly analyze innocent students from their syllabi. So there’s Lisa Cuddy, at the opening of the semester, one of a line of students halfway around the block. She gets to the counter, gives the guy her list, and gets a load of unasked-for and troublingly accurate personal information along with her books. She goes away, intrigued.

For House, of course, she was one of the teeming masses of students looking for books. He doesn’t notice her till later, when he hears her arguing with the professor in endocrinology. He doesn’t remember her from the bookstore; he doesn’t even know (then) that she’s an undergrad. But he’s intrigued. He tracks her down at a campus dance. It’s their first dance together, and from his point of view, this was all his own idea. He picked her out; he pursued her.

He goes on thinking that as the next few months pass. Cuddy knows differently. One night they’re at a party given by one of their classmates, a mutual friend, and she makes her move. They spend the night together.

And then he disappears. She gets that something happened, she gets that he's not around – but not even a phone call?

So all this time, House has assumed the determination of their relationship had been in his hands; that he had planned it and courted her. Actually, it was strong-willed Lisa Cuddy who’d singled him out; Cuddy who knew what she wanted in school and (she thought) in life; Cuddy, the future endocrinologist, who talked her way into attending classes undergrads weren’t supposed to get into; Cuddy who came out of the whole thing thinking that maybe what she’d wanted this time just hadn’t wanted her back. And that’s colored her relationship with House ever since.

So House learns that their relationship didn’t begin the way he thought; and Cuddy learns that their relationship didn’t end the way she thought. There’s nothing more poignant than knowledge that comes too late. (As my favorite episode of Babylon 5 attests.) And when we were going through actual programming schedules from medical conferences, and the first one we read listed an 80s dance, it seemed serendipitous. Where better to discuss the 80s? (As someone who lived through that decade, the idea of an 80s dance always feels to me like having a party on Wednesday in honor of Tuesday. But I digress.) (I also have a compulsion to give characters "their moment," a drop of honey in the cup, particularly when they've had bad times before, or have bad times ahead. I once argued passionately on Smallville to let Clark take Chloe to the prom in season one; that poor girl had been passed over all year. The character deserved her moment!)

So. Yes. Continuity? I may not always be perfect. Sometimes, in fact, I make stupid mistakes, and the doom of television is that they never go away. But I happen to give a damn.

Back home, although it's cool this evening here! How quickly we adjust . . .


Various links, no particular order or theme.

Belatedly for Veterans' Day: My Meeting with the President at Arlington.

While in Oregon, we drove into the countryside for a visit to this long-time family favorite, Hazelnut Hill, a local family farm which sells hazelnuts (more properly called filberts in the Willamette Valley), almonds, walnuts, plain or roasted or covered with chocolate including milk, bittersweet, and hardcore dark, as well as chocolate covered berries, hazelnut toffee, and so on and so forth most wonderfully. They do mail order. Their prices are quite reasonable.

Keep an eye open on your local PBS station for a broadcast of Pidgin: The Voice of Hawaii, a documentary directed by a friend of mine. It won the Audience Award for Best Documentary at the HIFF (Hawaii International Film Festival) 2009.

http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/11/very-sekrit-passphrase.html

There were 38 independent bookshops around the land who had Graveyard Book parties. The people at Harpers somehow got it down to 11, and they sent them to me to judge the winner. The winner gets me for a signing in December. I watched the 11 videos/descriptions/ photos. I watched them again. I watched them yet again, this time with Lorraine, my assistant, watching too and saying helpful things like, "They are all so good. Whoo. Don't know how you'll make a decision. Look at that! They're line dancing to Monster Mash! And that Death is on stilts, isn't he. Is that a horse? A horse in a store? These are amazing." The fourth time, Woodsman Hans wandered in from the deep woods (where he is making a pond) and watched them too.Here is Doug Jones and some strange man it said.
Hi Neil,

I am a long-time fan, and have even met you backstage at a Tori show (though that was many years ago!). I am writing to ask a bit of a favor.

About 10 years ago, I appeared on 20/20 with Tori, speaking about sexual violence. Since then, I've stayed close with Tori whose been a mentor of the best kind. I also started a nonprofit, Pandora's Project, that provides support, information, and resources to rape and sexual abuse survivors and their supporters. We operate Pandora's Aquarium, an online support group with more than 20,000 registered members.

Recently, I was named a 2009 L'Oreal Woman of Worth for my volunteer work with Pandora's. I was chosen for this honor from more than 2,500 applicants.

Now, one of the ten 2009 Honorees will be selected as the national honoree through a public online vote. Her cause will get an additional $25,000, and a lot of media exposure. This is the first time L'Oreal has recognized a sexual violence organization, and becoming the national honoree would allow me to shine a spotlight on this issue that affects so many women and women.

Voting is easy - people just need to go to the url below, enter their email address in the box on the right, and click the "submit vote" button. Each email address is allowed one vote, and voting ends November 24.

http://www.womenofworth.com/Honorees/Honoree2009Detail.aspx?nomid=5657c940-425b-47a2-879d-ed3c2d82b56f

I am wondering if you might be willing to send people to this voting link via your (infinitely popular) twitter or blog. I understand if it's not something you can do, but my experience running a small-budget nonprofit tells me it's always wise to ask!

Thank you for taking the time to read this.

Shannon Lambert

I'll plug it happily.

Your correspondent asks "Will you be reading the original version where the wolf actually is killed, and not the 'oh my goodness our kids can't hear about death' version in which they bring him to the zoo?"

I fear she's in error; in the original version, written by Prokofiev, Peter snares the wolf, then convinces the hunters NOT to kill it, but to take it to the zoo.

I've been researching, and that's what I found out too. Wikipedia has a list of changes made in various versions of the story (Disney, for example, had the wolf not eat the duck). But the wolf was always taken to the zoo...

There's a special bonus feature in the hardcover release of Farscape: Uncharted Tales Volume 1: D'Argo's Lament -- a Farscape short story by yours truly! The story in Lament is a semi-sequel to a short story I wrote called "Many a Mile to Freedom," which appeared in the very first issue of Farscape: The Official Magazine in 2001. If you pick up the hardcover, you can read that story, which has been reprinted in the back of the volume!

Veterans Day
Remembrance Day (Canada)

THE SUSTAINING POWER OF ICE

The sustaining power of ice at various degrees of thickness:

At a thickness of two inches, will support a man.
At a thickness of four inches, will support a man on horseback.
At a thickness of six inches, will support teams with moderate loads.
At a thickness of eight inches, will support heavy loads.
At a thickness of ten inches, will support 1,000 pounds to the square foot.

---Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889


When we remember that we are all mad, the mysteries disappear nad life stands explained.
Mark Twain (1835-1910)

Also, a little egoboo. I had put in for a small but intriguing writing job, which I had done previously with different personnel, and got the usual, politely edited version of "I have no idea who you are but the boss is pushing you (are you a relative?) and it's nice you're interested, so big long-suffering sigh, can you do any of this type of work and if so, not that I expect you be able to, would you tell me what you can (or will) do?"

So I told her.

And got the usual "OMG OMG YOU'RE A REAL PUBLISHED WRITER WITH REAL DEGREES OMG OMG I CAN'T BELIEVE HOW MUCH YOU CAN DO WE'RE SO LUCKY TO HAVE YOU OMG OMG!"

Happens every time.

Then Pook and I had a lesson. Once every 4-6 weeks is doing it for us. I might add an extra one in January before the SRS clinic (Bereiter Florian Zimmermann in Scottsdale, AZ, 28-31 January, S and I are both riding--S on F/Sa and me F/Sa/Su--hauling up Thursday, auditors totally welcome and it's pretty cheap, $15/day or thereabouts, also ride slots still open, those aren't so cheap but consider what you get). We'll see.( NEEEEEEP! )

• 12:28 RT @smoemeth this is so many different kinds of awesome: bit.ly/2IWDsr #
• 12:28 Lesson coma O_O #

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Spent all day today trying to push through and get last details done and loose ends tied up, and I'm still not done, damn it. The yays today have seriously been outweighed by the boos. Thankfully they've all been of the minor pinch-boos rather than anything dire, so I'm going to call that a Yay.

I was kinda bummed to get a rejection in the mail on a short story -- never mind that I didn't think it would result in a sale first time out, you always, quietly, hope. Tomorrow, after some thought, it will go out again. Because that part of the game never changes.

EtA: and the best phrase of the day comes from Madame Editrix: "crises fairies" As in "The crises fairies are exhausted now, and will leave you alone."


So.. what's a major yay in the world? Anything? Come on, somebody's had to have had a YAY! day....

Can't believe I forgot to post this, especially given both the subject matter and the guest list.....

The Chronic Rift podcast has a Roundtable discussion on the greatest detective who ever lived, Sherlock Holmes, with John and Andrea joined by authors Kevin Lauderdale (Star Trek: Constellations, Cthulhu Unbound) and Laurie R. King (the Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes series of novels, and also one of my favorite authors). You don't wanna miss this one. Seriously.

The episode is available by subscription off iTunes, or directly from either the Rift web site or the Rift page on Mevio. And please comment either on the forums or at the toll-free number 888-866-9010.

Unknown to most, there was one action figure set from the original dozen that were done by Kenner in 1977 for Star Wars, but didn't make the final cut...............

*tee hee*

http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2009/11/radio-books-violin-lessons-also-haircut.html

Went in to KNOW radio station in ST Paul today and recorded an introduction to the NPR MORNING EDITION "Open Mike" piece I've been recording on audiobooks, and heard the edit. Asked them to see if they could find a bit more time in the piece for Audible founder Don Katz, who did an amazing interview and was pared down to about a sentence in the current edit. It'll go out in the next ten days, and as soon as I know when it goes out I'll put it up here. I talk to David Sedaris, Martin Jarvis, Don Katz and veteran audio producer/director Rick Harris in it.
Hi Neil,

I just read about your event in January, where in you will be narrating Peter and the Wolf. My husband and I are over joyed by this. We will hopefully be bringing our three girls up to see the performance. We did have one question though. Will you be reading the original version where the wolf actually is killed, and not the "oh my goodness our kids can't hear about death" version in which they bring him to the zoo? We are both, obviously, really hopeful that being you, and not afraid to scare children (thank you for that btw) will be speaking the true to the story version in which Peter shoots the wolf and then his dead body is paraded through the town as a trophy.

Thanks for your time,
~Cecily

PS- Do you know if there will be tickets for the event or the reception afterwards? It will be a long drive, and it would be nice to be prepared for either staking out seats all day or having tickets in hand. (We could not find any reservation information on the website)

I'd forgotten - or never knew - that there was an alternative version. The script I was sent is the Zoo version. I'll investigate...

And no, I do not know about tickets. I will find out.

Dear Neil,

Your Web Goblin offered to post photos of Coraline pumpkins, and when they were told this, my 8 and 11-year old daughters decided to make some. Here they are, along with 2 emoticon pumpkins and a turnip.

http://www.steampunkfamily.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/IMG_01521-300x225.jpg

I used them to illustrate a ghost story: http://www.steampunkfamily.com/2009/10/philomenas-fright/

Three of the four of us were Coraline characters for Halloween. (The 11-year old went her own way as Susan Sto-Helit.)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/37435081@N03/4077708519/sizes/l/in/set-72157622616148613/

The Other Mother is the scariest thing I've ever been for Halloween. All the children (even the 4-year olds!) knew who I was, and I elicited much nervous laughter when I offered to sew buttons in their eyes.

Thank you for being VERY SCARY INDEED

I love how many families were Coraline families, this year.

If, like me, anybody else was intrigued by your mention of Kenneth Grahame's other works and wants to read them with a minimum of searching, they'll be happy to know both 'The Golden Age' and 'Dream Days' are available for free on the always invaluable Project Gutenberg:

http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/291
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/270

Thanks for mentioning them in the first place; I'm always interested in children's lit of that time that has managed to slip through my net.

- B. Bolander

What a good idea. Two very beautiful, gently funny books by the author of The Wind in the Willows. I really enjoyed them, but stylistically they are, well, out of fashion, and will not be everybody's cup of Edwardian tea. Here's a passage that describes the illustration I put up yesterday, as small children steal through the house on a midnight expedition to obtain biscuits (ie cookies, if you are American):

The Blue Room had in prehistoric times been added to by taking in a superfluous passage, and so not only had the advantage of two doors, but enabled us to get to the head of the stairs without passing the chamber wherein our dragon-aunt lay couched. It was rarely occupied, except when a casual uncle came down for the night. We entered in noiseless file, the room being plunged in darkness, except for a bright strip of moonlight on the floor, across which we must pass for our exit. On this our leading lady chose to pause, seizing the opportunity to study the hang of her new dressing-gown. Greatly satisfied thereat, she proceeded, after the feminine fashion, to peacock and to pose, pacing a minuet down the moonlit patch with an imaginary partner. This was too much for Edward's histrionic instincts, and after a moment's pause he drew his single-stick, and with flourishes meet for the occasion, strode onto the stage. A struggle ensued on approved lines, at the end of which Selina was stabbed slowly and with unction, and her corpse borne from the chamber by the ruthless cavalier. The rest of us rushed after in a clump, with capers and gesticulations of delight; the special charm of the performance lying in the necessity for its being carried out with the dumbest of dumb shows.

Once out on the dark landing, the noise of the storm without told us that we had exaggerated the necessity for silence; so, grasping the tails of each other's nightgowns even as Alpine climbers rope themselves together in perilous places, we fared stoutly down the staircase-moraine, and across the grim glacier of the hall, to where a faint glimmer from the half-open door of the drawing-room beckoned to us like friendly hostel-lights. Entering, we found that our thriftless seniors had left the sound red heart of a fire, easily coaxed into a cheerful blaze; and biscuits—a plateful—smiled at us in an encouraging sort of way, together with the halves of a lemon, already once squeezed but still suckable. The biscuits were righteously shared, the lemon segments passed from mouth to mouth; and as we squatted round the fire, its genial warmth consoling our unclad limbs, we realised that so many nocturnal perils had not been braved in vain.

"It's a funny thing," said Edward, as we chatted, "how I hate this room in the daytime. It always means having your face washed, and your hair brushed, and talking silly company talk. But to-night it's really quite jolly. Looks different, somehow."

"I never can make out," I said, "what people come here to tea for. They can have their own tea at home if they like,—they're not poor people,—with jam and things, and drink out of their saucer, and suck their fingers and enjoy themselves; but they come here from a long way off, and sit up straight with their feet off the bars of their chairs, and have one cup, and talk the same sort of stuff every time."

Selina sniffed disdainfully. "You don't know anything about it," she said. "In society you have to call on each other. It's the proper thing to do."

"Pooh! YOU'RE not in society," said Edward, politely; "and, what's more, you never will be."

"Yes, I shall, some day," retorted Selina; "but I shan't ask you to come and see me, so there!"

"Wouldn't come if you did," growled Edward.