Neil Gaiman’s on tour with his fantastic new book, The Graveyard Book. I’m about halfway through it and enjoying it immensely — it’s the spookiest, coolest, most dream-like and smart young adult horror novel I’ve read. As he tours, Neil is reading the book aloud, a different chapter at every stop, and his publishers are putting the readings online every day, chapter after chapter. Neil’s a fantastic reader, probably the best living author-reader I’ve heard (except, maybe, for the magnificent, towering brilliance that is Daniel Pinkwater), and this is a do-not-miss bit of free vid.
So… the tour has started. At each tour stop I read a chapter of the book, and each evening’s reading is being filmed. (Tour schedule is up at http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2008/09/graveyard-book-tour.html and at Where’s Neil)http://www.mousecircus.com/videotour.aspx is the page on which the readings will be posted.
After the show last night (a lovely review of it here in Publishers Weekly), I grabbed a late dinner with my Harper Childrens editor, Elise Howard, at the loveliness that is Sushi Sasabune (73rd and 1st), while filmmaker and cameraman Brady Hall worked late into the night editing the video of last night’s chapter, then rendering and uploading it.
So, the FIRST CHAPTER of The Graveyard Book is now up. The short hair looks even odder than it usually does.
Tonight I’ll read the second chapter. That should be up by tomorrow. And so on.
By the end of the tour you get a free book. (Well, free in the sense that it’s something you don’t have to pay for, anyway.)
(Thanks, Neil!)