Review: Odd and the Frost Giants By Neil Gaiman

I read Odd and the Frost Giants yesterday as a break from labouring on The Woodsman. Something I could fall into for an hour in order to think about something else; no real intention to review it. Reviewing Neil’s work is hard because I am quite clearly and obviously a big fan. No matter how many times I point out that I actually think Stardust – although enjoyable – is quite a weak novel technically speaking, or that much of his poetry simply falls short of his fiction, people rightly view me as biased.

But the problem is I do like to talk about his work.

Odd and the Frost Giants tells the tale of a Viking boy called Odd. Odd has had a hard time of it growing up: father dies at sea, mother remarries a bad tempered oaf and he accidentally shatters his own leg trying to use his dad’s axe.

One winter, after the snow has stretched on far too long Odd escapes his obnoxious step family by retreating into the forest to his father’s old cabin. On his journey he meets a bear, a fox and an eagle; creatures with a story that sends Odd farther than he ever imagined.

A journey to Asgard, the land of the gods, and an appointment with some frost giants.

It’s easy to forget just how clever Neil Gaiman is. Beneath the charm, the floppy hair, the disarming smile and the aura of eccentric dishevelment wrapped in a leather jacket it’s easy to overlook that there are some serious smarts lurking beneath the curls.

Odd and the Frost Giants is a beautifully crafted example of this. On the face of it you have an obvious, unashamed, recycling of Norse mythology into the form of a longish short story. Fun, entertaining but not too much going on.

This is a mistake.

Delving a little deeper you’ll find a whole host of cleverly blended mythology, history and fairy story, sprinkled with narrative echoes of Milne – intentional or not - and finished off with a healthy swig of humour. Imparted in the story - transmitted if you like - is a deep love of Norse mythology along with – hopefully – enough nuggets of knowledge to encourage children to pick up more books. To find out if bits of the story are true. To ask questions like “Did ice really once cover the world?” and “There were Vikings in Scotland, no way! Where did they go?”.

Told with prose that is direct, clean and crafted to let the story run with minimal interference from the author, Odd and the Frost Giants is a welcome escape for an hour whether you’re six or sixty.

And remember: all proceeds go to this.

Eastercon Photos

One of the people in this picture is excited and the other has just seen the size of the queue. You work out which:

The Friday Flash Fictioneers of the Apocalypse:

Left to right: Gareth D Jones, Martin McGrath, Paul Graham Raven, Me, Gareth L Powell, Justin Pickard and Shaun C Green

Eastercon: China, Neil and Charlie oh my…

So over at Nostalgia for the Future, Justin has an excellent write up of Eastercon and nicely distills China’s keynote. China was a bit of a revelation. A fascinatingly literate and erudite speaker; I spent a lot of the weekend coming out of his panels with a list of words that I hadn’t known existed.

But that’s a little flippant, and something you can work out from reading his stuff and/or searching on youtube for footage of him speaking.

The other thing I learned is that he’s a thoroughly nice man. Over the course of the weekend I saw him taking time to speak to various fans, even when he was trying to grab a quiet five minutes in the bar. And showing remarkable patience. If you ever get a chance to hear him speak you should take it.

Then there was Neil (Gaiman - I’m not talking in the third person again). *coughs* You may have noticed that I’m a bit of a fan. And there seems to be an ongoing strange phenomena where by our paths pass very close to each other but we never actually meet or exchange words. This happened all weekend to the point where I believe if we ever met it would cause some kind of causal break in reality, you know: You must never cross the Neils or the universe will end.

Anyway, I’ve seen him speak a bunch of times therefore I was concerned that I’d just hear a collection of anecdotes I’d heard in other sessions. I was wrong and it was good. The Graveyard Book sounds great, very dark and possibly something fairly different from what he’s done to date. His panels were fascinating and it was cool to see him get all fanboy over Hitchhikers.

And he was very kind to the moderators, some of whom were understandably quite nervous.

Charlie Stross was fascinating. Smart in an entirely different to China but equally compelling manner and a fellow alumni of Bradford university. Although I struggled to keep up in places - I’m really more of fantasy guy than hard SF - the panels I attended were just engrossing. And I love that phrase “the rapture of the geeks”.

And a good time was had. Save for the whole bleeding thing.

New Year, New Challenges, Same Dodgy Haircut

Well it’s now 2008.

2007 was a funny year. I got to travel to new places (Paris, Washington, Hong Kong, Hamburg). I got to be embarrassing in front of one of my favourite writers…several times. I spent the first year in my own house (kind of - I think technically I only own the door at the moment). And someone (Aphelion) actually published one of my stories (The House), even more brilliantly another agreed to publish one (The Mine) in a magazine people pay to read.

On the other hand it was quite trying as the house slowly revealed disaster after disaster.

2008? Well it’s shaping up pretty good so far:

The Mine will be published sometime this month in Jupiter SF (you can subscribe – I encourage you to do so – or you can purchase single issues from the website). Naturally I’ll let you know when it’s out.

In March I’ll be at the Orbital Eastercon along with many of the other Friday Flash Fictioneers for a Flash Fiction workshop. Whilst milling around the con I will no doubt embarrass myself again in front of another person called Neil.

In June(ish) I’m off to New Zealand to see some old friends I haven’t seen in an age although in reality it’s only been a little over a year. Oh and I’ll become an uncle for the first time, go team Beynon.

I’m certain, given I’m writing right now, that there’ll be plenty more fiction from me this year, hopefully more in print.

Beyond that it’s all adventure…and most likely, because it’s me, some slapstick.

More Top Fives: Short Stories

I’m back in London. I spent most of yesterday driving, we took the opportunity to call in with some friends on the way back and we were not helped by proper Welsh rain. Now I’m quite enjoying flumping on my own sofa and not doing anything. Ergo there are no hilarious hijinks to report.

I’d better talk about something else then.

This year I’ve been very fortunate in reading many, many, excellent short stories. You know the kind of stories you read and they’re so good your breath is slightly taken away, you’re not sure whether to feel jealous or joyous, they have in short left their mark on you.

Here’s my top five (that I’ve read this year, in ascending order):

5. The Last Reef by Gareth Lyn Powell - I missed this when it was in print in Interzone but managed to catch it the second time round when it was released online earlier this year. The sf conceits in this story are not new, you won’t be blown away by a startling vision of the future, but what you will find is a brilliantly charming character driven piece, great imagery and some really tight writing.

4. Shattered Like A Glass Goblin by Harlan Ellison - I’ve like Ellison’s work since my teens but found it quite hard to pick up for some reason, I’d get scraps here and there. This year I treated myself to a massive volume: “The Essential Ellison”. There’s a plethora of good stories including “Repent, Harlequin!” Said the Ticktockman but, so far, Shattered Like A Glass Goblin is my favourite. The writing is tight; the imagery achieved with a surgeon like use of language, a well crafted allegory wrapped inside a terrifying dark fantasy. And Ellison doesn’t need the likes of me fawning over him, so I’ll shut up now. Read it.

3. How Do You Think It Feels? by Neil Gaiman - There aren’t enough stories about gargoyles, not in my opinion anyway. For a long time this year this was my favourite short story. It is a beautiful, sad, dark, strange, well crafted story. An unsettling meditation on love and loss. Gaiman at his best.

2. The Ladies of Grace Adieu by Susanna Clarke - I’d been curious to read Susanna’s break through short story for ages; it has fast become the thing of legend, a story wannabe fantasy writers tell each other late at night with a kind of jealous awe. And there’s a very good reason. It’s off-the-page good. The kind of good that has you chewing your fist, asking why? how? and shaking your head with the cold knowledge that you’ll most likely never achieve such heights. Even with all that it’s a joy. You’re missing out if you don’t read this one.

1. The Cape by Joe Hill - I nearly didn’t read this at all. An ugly confession but it’s true. I read Joe’s first novel “Heart Shaped Box” and loved it, it was the best first novel I’d read in ages. I raved about it, I lent it to friends and basked in the reflected glory as they in turn raved about it. Then I went looking for his short fiction.

Eventually I managed to get hold of a copy of Best New Horror via an anthology. And wasn’t fussed. There I said it. Yes I know it won awards. Yes I know many raved about it including Neil Gaiman. But it wasn’t for me. And so I wasn’t sure about whether to pick up Joe’s collection. For about thirty seconds.

Picked up in an airport bookstore in Washington, Joe’s first collection 20th Century Ghosts is the most consistent short story collection I have ever read. Just the nuts. From the beautifully crafted ghost story that the collection takes its title from to the wonderfully strange, wonderfully moving Pop Art to the disturbing darkness of Abraham’s Boys.

But for me the one that got me, that really got inside my defences and ripped it up was The Cape. It’s a perfect short story from a writer at the height of his powers: you want to spend time with the characters, you recognise them, the pacing is perfect, the chills are cold icy hands on the back of your neck. And I didn’t see the end coming, pretty rare for me.

And that’s my top five. What’s yours?

Merry Christmas

It’s Christmas morning here in the UK. At least for the next twenty minutes or so.

I’ve already had a glass of champagne and, by way of warm up for eating my own body weight in turkey, smoked salmon and scrambled egg on toast. Oh yes, we do Christmas in style here.

My presents have gone down well. I’m pleased about this as I’d been a lot more organised this year and one or two presents were a gamble as to whether someone else had bought them or not.

I’ve had a remarkably good haul this year; people have been very generous and very thoughtful. Somewhere along the way people got the idea I’m a Neil Gaiman fan, I can’t imagine where Thanks to some masterful co-ordination of my family by G I know have a much larger Sandman collection than I had before.

The great thing is my youngest sister has become a huge Gaiman fan in recent months also getting a substantial amount of the Gaiman back catalogue and I get to play the cool older brother who recommends good stuff. There’s not much opportunity for that anymore now all my siblings are pretty much grown up.

Anyway, I’m being antisocial now and really the point of this entry is just to wish all my readers a very Merry [insert festival name here]/Christmas.

And remember a turkey isn’t just for Christmas, there’s Boxing Day too. (Best I could do at this time of day.)

MirrorMask

My sister, S, was visiting this weekend. And very kindly brought her copy of MirrorMask up for me to watch. The plan had been to watch it on Saturday evening after an afternoon spent with a collection of my old school friends.

Plans went a bit awry after I sampled one of my friend’s home brew cider. People who know me in meatspace will know that I have the alcohol tolerance of a Chihuahua and that this was a foolish move.

I don’t know what was in this cider, I don’t want to know, I just know it only stayed inside me for around four hours - if you know what I mean.

Anyway. I didn’t get round to watching MirrorMask until this morning and was, it’s fair to say, a little worse for wear. Even so I think I would have had the same reaction even if I were feeling bouncier.

The reaction: F**K Me That Was Good.

The film tells the tale of Helena a circus girl who longs for a normal life away from her crazy parents, played by the charming Rob Brydon and the divine Gina McKee. When her mother falls sick off the back of a nasty argument Helena begins to question her own behaviour.

The night before her mother’s operation she falls asleep in her aunt’s house surrounded by her own drawings and when she wakes up things are not what they should be.

Finding herself in a strange world, ostensibly of her own creation, Helena must find the MirrorMask in order to awaken the Queen of Light and restore balance to that world. Only then can she return home to her sick mother.

To be fair, as someone who adored Dark Crystal and loved Labyrinth, I was pretty much their target market. And in the interests of being upfront there were some pretty clear riffs on both of these as well as the far older tales that those films in turn are taking inspiration from.

It doesn’t matter. That’s the way the world goes round. The result is genius. And let’s face it, how could you go wrong:

Take good ideas from these honourable predecessors, sprinkle with whatever you find in Gaiman/McKean gesult mind then compress through the boiler room of McKean’s filmmaker’s eye. It’s gold.

I know this was always meant to be a straight to DVD release. Yet I honestly have no idea why it didn’t get a wider cinema release, it’s a breathtaking achievement for such a small budget.

Buy it. Watch it. Enjoy it.

I have seen the future of film. His name is Dave McKean.

Beowulf 3D

Ok, now I get it.

Constant readers will recall that I saw Beowulf a few weeks ago and that I was not all that impressed. I thumped my animation bible, cursing motion capture as the work of the devil.

Which makes this kind of embarrassing because last night I saw Beowulf in 3D at the IMAX in Waterloo. This time I wasn’t disappointed.

Many of the things that looked…well kind of naff in the 2d version only render with any kind of realism in the 3D format, this includes the curious pirrouets the thrown men perform during the many action sequences.

Even the eye movements – about which I was quite scathing in my review of the 2D version – are better in 3D. They still don’t entirely synch up but you don’t really notice it because the cutting together of shots compensates for it.

And the textures. Well if the texture artists don’t win some kind of award it’s a crime. That’s what brings the film alive for me, in 3D the characters all have texture, depth and weight.

I guess money was behind the decision to release a 2D version that so closely matched the 3D version but for me it was still a massive error. I can’t help thinking if the 2D version had been cut for 2D it would have hung together better.

The final verdict: see it in 3D. Don’t bother in 2D: it’s not meant for 2D, it’s not cut for 2D.

For anyone who was wondering how they do 3D projection these days, good news: they don’t use those multi-coloured shades any more.

And so no need to worry about looking silly.

Beowulf

Normally I post reviews within a few hours of having seen the film but I waited in the case of Beowulf. Why?

I needed time to digest it, to consider what I thought and to wonder if I should in fact wait to see it in 3D before making a decision. I still plan to see it in 3D but I thought it would be an interesting idea to post my thoughts on the 2D version and then an update when I get to the IMAX.

Mainly I decided I couldn’t wait after reading a fairly lengthy tirade by Hal Duncan on his blog. Hal is a writer who has me periodically shaking my head in awe at his frenetically fuelled prose and in bewilderment at some of his more outspoken views. The review is one of the latter occasions.

And I just can’t agree. Well not completely.

Yes I’m a Gaiman fan. And yes it’s been a while since I read the original poem. But that will not mean this review is a white wash, oh no - wait and see.

However, even in my semi-comatose-post-work-state, I could work out what Gaiman and Avery had tried to do with the screenplay. That it did not amount to oversimplification, that it was indeed, dare I say it, bordering on clever. It wasn’t a film with nothing to say but had stuff on the nature of fame, the nature of heroism and even a fair thrust at how history is written by the winners.

The fact that the film wasn’t brilliant, and certainly wasn’t the break through I’d heard it described as, by amongst others Gaiman himself, was nothing to do with the screenplay.

Nor was it the fault of Glover who’s performance as Grendel was terrifying and brilliant all at the same time – yes it is his movements they use, thanks to the use of motion capture techniques.

No I fear the blame has to lie with Zemeckis. The film is not a success because of the use of motion capture. It simply isn’t a good enough technology to use; it may never be because of one fatal flaw. It fails to capture the interaction between actors – if indeed there was any – and so we are treated to great individual performances from Glover, Hopkins (although using his native Welsh accent was a baaad idea, much as I love my native burrrr), Jolie and even Ray.

But they never mesh, they never connect. And that’s the problem with mo-cap.

If you want to create a hyper real world – and it really is effective for this type of material – you need to use the actual actors, on screen, together. The reason Glover’s performance is so much better than the others is simple: he’s the only one who has grasped the need to communicate his performance via his body rather than his face.

Now if you want to use 3D animation you need animators. I don’t want to sound puritanical about this but in CGI it is animators who make performances come alive. Until motion capture can capture character interaction accurately this will always be the case, and I suspect it will remain so even after that point because it’s such an alien medium. You can never just act like the real world. Movement has to be turned down a notch in some cases and turned up in others.

I’ll get off my geeky high horse in just a moment. The last criticism I have of the cgi is weight, the characters lack it and so the violence of much of the film loses its effect as characters are flung through the air. Who cares? They don’t weigh anything. They aren’t real. Indeed the only scene where a character seems to have real weight is near the end when Beowulf is hanging from the dragon. Even then it’s touch and go.

So what did I think?

I want to see it in 3D.

In 3D I’m fairly sure I won’t notice the deficiencies and that I’ll have the wow reaction I was kind of expecting. As a 2D effort I’m afraid the direction lets it down and the performances, well I’ve harped on it enough.

As a 2D offering it’s…well…flat.

Kindling a debate

Amazon have released the Kindle reigniting the debate over the future of the book pulling in comments from many people such as John Scalzi over at Whatever and Paul Raven over at Velcro City. Meanwhile Neil Gaiman’s got in on the action, you can check out his thoughts here.

Neil makes a pretty compelling argument for the Kindle’s place in the world (for people who are mobile, people in remote locations and people who need to carry lots of books around). I remain more of a skeptic, not so much about the principle as someone is going to do it sooner or later, no my doubts are more about this device and the business model.

Sure mass storage is a great boon, I travel more these days myself and I could do without that moment of panic as to whether that fourth book is going to put me over the baggage allowance, yet it is the issue of battery life that really gets me.

I’m absent minded and busy. Between my job, my writing and trying to renovate my house I forget to charge my phone, my ipod (now a new ipod touch - yay!) and various other gadgets on a regular basis. I do not want to run out of power just as Poirot is explaining who did it or King is pulling the monster out of the closet. My paperback does not require charging, is already portable and barring fire or flood pretty durable. In short I need a bit more than “you can carry more” - I’m pretty skilled in secreting paperbacks all over my personage.

So this is my question: Why can’t they produce one with a solar powered battery? Because that coupled with mass storage and a screen as readable as a book…well that would be a break through device. That would take publishing properly digital.

The other slight bone of contention is the pricing model, it doesn’t seem to have been thought out and raises all sorts of issues such as “how much goes to the author?”, “why would someone pay for newspaper subs when you can access it online for free?”, “is there even a role for the publisher?” and my personal favourite “I don’t want to buy from Amazon as I’m worried about independent booksellers”. This is a second order problem but it won’t go away.

Of course the fact that I will almost certainly run out and buy one as soon as it’s available in the UK is neither here nor there. That’s a post for a different day - possibly entitled OCD and how to live with it or Gadgets: An addiction or a choice?