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Here’s a link to a great interview with Neil Gaiman from a couple of weeks ago. He talks about the process of writing and filming Coraline and the 18-month loneliness of producing his gigantic novel American Gods. He describes the completion of that massive novel as a release from prison, ironic considering that’s exactly how the novel begins. “Barely said a word to anyone” during that time, he recalls, and had to relearn the art of conversation. Good to know.

Gaiman also talks here a fair bit about genre. Fascinating that the first editor Gaiman showed the manuscript to said the story was unpublishable on the grounds that it was a horror story written for a mixed audience of children and adults. Today we hear that and scoff – of course you can write for young and adult audiences at once. But Gaiman began writing Coraline in the early 90s, way before JK Rowling, as Gaiman points out, showed the world that much $$$ could result from that kind of genre mixing. Of course, I wonder if this idea that’s supposedly new to the publishing industry hadn’t been common knowledge for decades in Hollywood, where family films always rake in the big bucks. Just look at this Memorial Day weekend. Ben Stiller’s fluffy film about museum nightlife is squashing what I’d call a far superior piece of work in Terminator Salvation. Oh, well. Enjoy your Gaiman.