Neil Gaiman announced that a slip case collection of the Sandman Trade Paperback will be released in November – just in time for Christmas. You can pre-order it from Amazon.
On a stupidly geeky aside: I’ve not read Sandman as I’ve not been able to piece together what would make a complete collection (mostly been too busy / lazy to do the five minutes of research it would take to figure this out) so this collection is exactly what I need… all the TBPs in one place! I tweeted a thank you to Gaiman for putting out the slip case collection (or rather for his asking DC to put out the slipcase edition) and he replied back with a ‘you’re welcome’ message. Yeah, may not sound like much, but it put me over the moon. 
Previously I’d said that while on holiday in Europe I’d do some thinking about A Case of Do or Die:
My original intent with ACODOD had been to showcase the talents of local artists by having a new artist illustrate each chapter. Sadly, it’s been hard to find reliable artists who can work in my budget (which, admittedly, is not much). Plus, being new to this, I had a hard time communicating what I needed from them. And, once I’d get into a groove with an artist, I’d start a new chapter and have to forge a relationship with a new illustrator all over again… not easy.
The story has been on hold for over a year now, and I was close to abandoning it entirely, but I think it’s an important tale to tell. There are other stories I want to write about Dieselverse San Francisco, but ACODOD sets the groundwork for this universe and NOT writing it would mean that Agostino’s story would haunt this world without ever being told.
I’m going to turn the script for the graphic novel into an illustrated novel. The difference between the two being that a graphic novel is a long, comic (actually, sequential art) piece. My new direction will be a traditional novel with illustrations – similar to the illustrated Frankenstein released in 1983.
I’ll rebuild the ACODOD website and have an archive section for the old version of the story. I’ll post the new story serially, though I am not sure at what interval – ideally two chapters a months, but it will depend on finances.
But before I do this, there’s a few things I need to take care of:
- I’m going to write a short “practice” story based on my recent trip to Europe which I’ve tentatively titled Six Days in Constantinople (not Istanbul) – this title will likely change.
- I need to prepare for the start of class in September. I’ve taken a position at SJSU teaching English to Japanese exchange students. It’s the closest I can get to my goal of teaching in Japan until I get the all clear from my oncologist. It’s a great opportunity and will give me a lot of experience for my CV – a real boon for when I start looking for jobs in Japan (and there’s a decent chance I may get transferred to a university in Japan anyway).
- I’m also holding a fund raiser for cancer research in late October that will require a lot of attention. More info on that to come.
That puts the start date for converting the script into a novel at some point in November, nearly six months away. Hopefully I can keep to the time frame… I’ll post updates during the process.
Edit: Though no one has said anything to me, I’d like to point out that the problems I had with unreliable artists were with people who I never hired to work on ACODOD. Those people whose work appears in the graphic novel were quite reliable.
