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Dork Tower by John Kovalic

Current Comic

Please support John by buying his stuff at your favorite game or comic shop. Alternatively you can shop online at Warehouse 23.

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Hey guys, andsoshewrites here! And today me and my dad are highlighting the Beatles on his radio show! I get to help co host, since I'm such a fan.

Go to 7890radio.com to listen to me[I'm Prudence] talk about Beatley things. And I'll be on AIM at JamesPMacca so you can request songs [late 50's - early 70's] or correct me on my Beatle trivia (I will get stuff wrong, I know it)

It's from 8am - 12pm est
[xposted]
[if this is not allowed, please delete]

The night air is cool and swarming with Japanese beetles. I'm pacing underneath the buzzing glare of the sodium arc lamps, a thick sheaf of papers in my hand, scanning them hard for the second reading of the night. Every story gets read once for pleasure, twice for critique, maybe three times for analysis. And this one has such moments of pure joy that I'm scrubbing the tears away from my eyes.

The door clicks. Kathleen comes down the stairs from her apartment, all long legs and fashionable clothing and sweeps of beautiful red hair. She's heading back to the common room, where she'll sit with seven other students in silence, flipping pages as she studies and dissects her three stories for the night.

We nod amiably to each other, an easy friendship that doesn't need any words. And as she passes by me, the glint of her sparkly red shoes reflects diamonds in the moonlight.

"Click your heels three times," I smirk.

She stops.

"I don't want to go home," she says. "This is better."

I think about it.

"Yeah," I say. "It is."

It feels like a little betrayal to say it. But three days. Three fucking days and we already have this artificial construct that brings us together, circling the wheel of our ka, eighteen students devoted to fiction and love and life. We want to be writers. And here, we are writers. There's no day job, no worry about the rent, nobody who isn't a writer to distract us.

We breathe in words and exhale analysis. Our minds are being broken, our stories flayed out, our fundamental assumptions about who we are as creators is being carefully shattered so that we can reassemble them into something stronger. More us.

This is our voice. It's in these bits here somewhere. And if we can clear away this underbrush that chokes us, we're going to shout so loud that nobody in the universe can stop us.

---

I love my classmates. It is a visceral love. A fierce love.

They give me such beautiful gifts.

The thing about Clarion is that our relationship started the moment the acceptions were announced. We scanned each other's blogs, friended each other on Facebook, chatted on AIM, asked dumb questions on our customized mailing list. I remember hunting for photos, going, who will this person be when he's not just words on a screen? Is his face kind? What does this smile in this snapshot tell me about him?

Before we even got here, we'd split from one ill-formed Clarion mass into eighteen personalities - some more clearly defined than others. But we'd begun to get a sense of our differing dreams.

And now I'm here. When I got off the plane, I could pick them out, one by one. I never missed a name, because everyone was someone to me. And I knew that Emily was sweet and considerate, and Dana was a colossal comics nerd, and Monica had cool dresses, and Steffi was the runner.

But come on, man. They're not here to make me happy. I'm here with my chainsaw in my keyboard, ready to rip shit to shreds. I know I've got some talent, at least. To be a writer is the purest form of ego - you're looking at the billions of words that other people have poured onto pages everywhere and then standing on a chair to scream, "I'M FUCKING BETTER THAN THAT!"

Honestly. You think you have something to say about the human condition that Shakespeare didn't get around to already? You're going up against every man who ever wrote a word, and with you're still squeezing yourself into the authorial crowd at the bar and going, "Yeah, whatever, you guys have had your say.... But listen to me."

So yeah. I have an ego. Have to. Otherwise, I'd never say anything. And when I get to Clarion, I've got my ideas soaked in Sterno and ready to set them on fire, and I'm hungry to be the best in the class, and I'm geared to show them how goddamned good I am.

And they're all nice people. I'm enjoying myself with them so much, throwing myself into those conversations about movies and crazy stories that I'm finding myself drawn to seventeen different people simultaneously. Their personalities come into close focus as I talk to them, and I discover that E.J. has the best deadpan delivery in the world, and Gra-with-an-accent has a rangy, easygoing charm that I adore, and shit, even as I write this now I'm like, man, I don't mean to leave you off the list, but you know how it is. This narrative will suffer if I list everyone.

Thing is, I know them as people. Writers? I can't say until they submit their story for the day. Every morning, three or four of them sends something out to us. That's when they all show me why they're here - yeah, Keffy's got a way of turning sarcasm into high art, but she wasn't brought here because of her conversational abilities.

And goddamn, I've been in critiques where there are weak sisters where you wonder why the fuck they're here. But no. Every person here. Each person. Every last one has a story that's fucking knocking my socks off.

Oh, the stories aren't perfect. I'm punching holes in all of them with my critiques along with the rest of us, pointing out bobbled endings, highlighting unclear narratives, wishing for less murky characterizations because I wnated to see more. But all of them have some core that's purest goodness, some area where my eyes pass over their words and my sclera flare bright green with envy.

Jesus Fucking Christ, I wish I'd written that, I think. And suddenly, Sarah, the girl who sends me bizarre links flourishes into Sarah, the girl who wrote that pristine intro to that Baba Yaga story, and my heart swells with pride because I'm in the room with her and that must mean that hey, I'm right here with them. I have my own strengths, and so do they, and we're all mixing our talents in one big cauldron to boil it down and distill the most beauteous moment of our voices.

It's why I stay up until one o'clock in the morning to scribble on your manuscripts, why I speak so loudly in class, why I wake up at 5:30 in the morning after three hours of sleep because my mind is so buzzing with ideas it hauls me out of bed.

These are my comrades. My team. My life. Day four, and already my world is filled with so many beautiful gifts that my heart aches with the strain of holding it all in. Day four feels like three weeks have already passed, and then Kelly Link is reading us a story that's light-years better even than that, and the gift of her art reminds us of how far we have to go - and of the trust that she's placing in us by taking a week out to come show us how to do it, to take that amazing award-winning brain that produced such perfect prose and trying her best to shape us.

And it is an us. My life for you, my friends. My art for you. My beauty in your hands.

Make me whole.

It are my birthday.

Man, I don't think anyone's going to have the energy to do anything cool, but it's fuckin' awesome here at Clarion. Loves to my folks at home. Loves to my new folks here.

Love all 'round, in fact.

A post on Oobject collects a bunch of medical mannequins from various vendors, including robot-like dental mannequins, rubber CPR dummies and highly articulated trauma mannequins with multiple injuries. [See my earlier entry about a Japanese elder care mannequin for another example of these figs.] They are all real examples of teaching tools that are really for sale, and their high level of detail, realism and flexibility makes them beautiful works of sculpture. Whenever I get a life-sized articulated doll, I will use a medical mannequin as the base for the body, as fashion mannequins do not match the sheer number of joints possessed by some of these plastic trauma victims.

Blog entry, Times-Picayune article, and funny message board thread about Chris' departure from the Delachaise.

http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2008/07/morning-found-me-miles-away.html

Still in Brazil. Still with Miss Maddy. Still having a lovely time.

Bought lots of books in the Paraty Festival bookshop today -- and saw many beautiful Brazilian editions of my stuff I hadn't seen before.

My favourite article read on the plane, incidentally, was the wonderful The Magic Olympics -- with tricks explained! by Alex Stone, in Harpers, which you can read online at: http://harpers.org/archive/2008/07/0082095 (my second favourite was the Gopnik article on Chesterton in the New Yorker, but it's not online, and I think he missed the boat about Chesterton politically). [My mistake. The Harpers article is only readable for subscribers.]

Hi Neil,You wrote a lovely story, told by Abel (I believe) about crows sitting in judgment on their storytellers. Somewhere along the way, this story became fact in my head. I was wondering if there is any truth to the myth, or if it's just myth. Maybe you could pass the question on to the Birdchick?Thanks!MRM

The description of corvids sitting around one of their number, cawing back and forth, and then sometimes killing it and sometimes flying off is something I've run into in old bird literature (and more recently as well -- since Sandman 40 came out I've read an eyewitness account of it in the Smithsonian Magazine). As to why it happens, I don't think you'll find any bird people who claim to know.

I should mention that the collective noun for rooks is not a parliament (which is actually the collective noun for owls) or it wasn't until I wrote Sandman 40, anyway. Mostly it's a building or a clamour of rooks. Sometimes it's a storytelling of rooks, which sounds like something I might have made up anyway...

Does Neil have an official myspace page? If so what is the adress?

No, I don't. There's an unofficial one, or more than one out there. I keep meaning to set up official myspaces and facebooks, but really tend to feel that keeping this place under control is more than enough for one author, and it never happens.

Hi Neil--Not really a question for you, just comment. You mentioned Tom Stoppard in your blog today. They say you should never meet your heroes, but they never say how cool it is when some of your heroes meet each other and get along so well. You seem to get along well with just about everyone. What just makes me smile is that so many of them are heroes of mine (Dave McKean, Roger Zelazny, Tom Stoppard, Philip Pullman,... ).Good luck growing up to be Mr. Stoppard. You seem well on your way.Have fun!
Geoff

Actually, you should never meet your heroes if you want to keep them as heroes. They may wind up as friends or as disappointments or as pleasant surprises, but once you know them they immediately stop being heroes. (I've turned down several opportunities to meet Stephen Sondheim socially, because he's practically all I've got left. Even David Bowie, who I've never even met, has managed to transmute in my head most of the way from DAVID BOWIE ZOMG!!1!* to my friend Duncan's dad.)

But then, I'm not sure about heroes at the best of times. I wrote about it at http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2004/10/whatever-happened-to-sancho-panza.asp
and still feel pretty much the same way now.

The most remarkable thing about Tom Stoppard (leaving aside the whole him-being-a-genius thing) is he's twenty years older than me, and he has my hair!

This gives me hope.



.......

*correct !!1! punctuation assistance here by Maddy.

Now that summer's coming up and people have more free time...

Would anyone be interested in a group re-read of Maurice? A chapter a week. It'd be good to get some discussion going and it might spawn some fic. Anyone?

Also, would the mod mind if I went through and tagged the posts? It'd be easier to find things, particularly chapter discussions, if anyone wants to refer back to them.

Title: The Most Utter Madness
Author: sweet_fallacy
Character(s): Kitty Hall, Clive Durham
Rating: G
Summary: After discovering her brother's secret, Kitty confronts Clive.

Summary: Creepy, luxuriously described dark fantasy about lonely, intelligent Clare and her seduction by titular doll maker. Convincing, sympathetic main character, smooth prose, kinky subtext and great insight into the weird, ambivalent relationships people have with their dolls -- all these things make The Doll Maker a neglected gem.
 

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Dork Tower by John Kovalic

Current Comic

Please support John by buying his stuff at your favorite game or comic shop. Alternatively you can shop online at Warehouse 23.

DT syndication services provided by John 'FuzzFace' McMahon
fuzzface00@livejournal.com
http://fuzzface00.livejournal.com/

http://www.io.com/~fuzzface/dt/dt.xml
Last Build Date: Wed, 02 Jul 2008 10:00:00 UTC-0500

Well, I got to bed at 1:30 last night and am up at 5:45. So thus far, my main descriptor would be, "Lots of time spent critiquing, no sleep." Theoretically we will all have time to socialize and romp and play our reindeer games together at some point, but the socialization - though there is a lot of it - is all occurring in the context of either walking to our classes or reading stories.

Good critiques are a gift. We're taking our time, really trying to get under the skin of the stories we've been given, because our classmates are heroic and deserve it. In this sense, it is like boot camp, because I'm already feeling like everyone here has my back. We're here to make each other into better writers, dammit, and we beat out a lot of other people to get here; none of us are slouches, and each new batch of submissions shows again that all the people here have the chops to make it work. So let's do this shit. Let's make it count.

This is extraordinary time.

At the same time, my roommate E.J. woke up yesterday and said, "Does it feel like Thursday to you?" And by God, after thirty-six hours it felt like a week had passed. I'm trying hard to remember that there are thirty-nine days left, because this has been a very intense time.

On the other hand, we can occasionally take brief breaks to stage dramatic readings of the funniest interview ever read. Man, I want this book.

http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2008/07/now-when-twilight-dims-sky-above.html

Maddy and I are now in Brazil. We got to the airport in Sao Paulo where the driver and Tom Stoppard were waiting, and then we drove down to Paraty. (At no point did I say to Tom Stoppard, "Funny old world innit? You wrote a film called Brazil, and now we're here." Tom Stoppard is, I discovered, who I want to be when I grow up. I did, however, tell him how much I liked his Waterstones story card.)

Anyway. All is good. We went off on a boat to an island and had a very late lunch, or a very early dinner, and after dinner I lay down on the roof of the boat as it chuntered back to Paraty and watched the sun set and slept under the stars, waking just before we docked.

I have a plan for Saturday -- I spoke to the Festival organisers and they seem happy with it. After the programme item (starts at 11:45, finishes around 1.00pm) I'll sign for whoever's there for as long as it takes. I figure this may take a while, but basically anyone there who wants a signature, whether they made it to the official event or had to content themselves with the big screen overflow or are just wandering around Paraty clutching an ancient Portuguese translation of Sandman. So if you were wondering whether or not it was worth your while making the trip to Paraty, yes, if you're here then, I'll sign your book.

Not a question, just a post on a glorious clockwork tower I thought you might enjoy.
http://cabinet-of-wonders.blogspot.com/2008/06/san-marco-clock-tower-venice.html

I was thinking the other day that it had been a while since I'd posted a link to cabinet of wonders - http://cabinet-of-wonders.blogspot.com/ - as I've been enjoying the recent grand tour, so I took this as a reminder. (My favourite recent article was http://cabinet-of-wonders.blogspot.com/2008/06/languages-of-tone-and-rhythm.html)

dear neil,
did you know that people are selling the graveyard book on abesbooks.co.uk?? is that allowed??

i've entered the epitaph competion because well i just had too what with the desperation and the sweaty paws and whatnot! Even so it feels a little like cheating, and in the unlikely event of winning a copy, i do think i might miss out on the all hallows atmosphere!

just thought i'd do a little 'grassing' seeing as i was in the neighbourhood, the stink of spoilsports to me! they wouldnt allow that with that Potter boy so why Bod?!

davey

Well, the publishers didn't send out advance reading copies with the Harry Potter books -- they were extremely strict about shops violating the on-sale date, though, which is a slightly different thing. Here you have books that people have been sent or given that they are putting up for sale on eBay or Abebooks.

The covers of the ARCs all say "Not for sale" on them, but most of the copies for sale are being sold by booksellers who got them at Book Expo America, and many of those booksellers use the sale of the various advanced copies of books they got there as a way to fund their trip to Book Expo. Which is my way of saying I can't get mad about it.

I'm most disappointed when copies proudly proclaim themselves to never have been read. The reason for the advanced reading copies is so that people can read them. So I hope the people who buy them on eBay or elsewhere read them and tell people about them, and don't just put them away in the dark as collectibles.

Is "bugger me sideways with a coracle" a real expression, or did you make it up?

You mean the two things are mutually exclusive? Everything has to be made up first... I mean, take the following as an example:

Hey Neil,

I found the most interesting thing today. I received a book order today including Creating Circles & Ceremonies by Oberon and Morning Glory Zell-Ravenheart. It's a Pagan ritual book. Anyway, I was looking through the appendices and they had a section listing Pantheons of different cultures and religions. Guess what was included in the list? THE ENDLESS. I was shocked! Apparently, people have created very successful rituals using the archetypes of The Endless. I guess your characters have taken on a life of their own! Just thought you might be interested in knowing that little tidbit.

Sincerely,
Christina