A few weeks ago, my best friend texted me and asked if I thought getting someone tickets to an event for their birthday was a good present, even if the seats weren’t the best. I said I thought it was fine, since they’d still get to see the event. As it turns out, the tickets were for me and her to see Neil Gaiman. She knew I loved Neil, because I talk a lot about his books, and thought it would be a good birthday present.

I wasn’t sure what to expect from listening to him. All the author events I’ve attended have been quite small in size, and they’ve all done meet and greets and book signings after. This wasn’t the case for Neil. The event took place in a downtown theater usually reserved for touring Broadway plays and such, and it was quite crowded.

When he came out, he briefly stated that he had just been at an event a couple of days ago at Stanford University, which due to the fires, felt like he was experiencing the Apocalypse, and how happy he was to land here and be able to see everything and breathe normally. He then launched right into a Q&A, answering questions that people had submitted before the event started. There were a lot of the basic questions (how do you work through writers block, what was your favorite book to read to your kids), but there were some new ones too. A person asked how they should get their husband to be okay to listening to Christmas music in November (Neil’s answer: Christmas music should only be played starting on December 19). Another asked if grief had ever influenced his writing (yes: he read a short story titled “The Man Who Forgot Ray Bradbury”, and afterwards talked about how it had been influenced by Terry Pratchett, who was suffering from a rare form of Alzheimer’s, and written as a tribute to Ray Bradbury. It was quite moving). 

It was wonderful listening to him speak. He has a very soothing voice, which I knew from listening to a couple of his books on audio that he had narrated. At one point, my friend leaned over and said she wanted to listen to his voice at night to fall asleep to because it was so soothing.

We ended up leaving a few minutes before the event ended, because my friend had just had minor surgery and wasn’t supposed to sit for long periods of time. On the way out, we walked by the merchandise table, where they were selling signed copies of his books. On the plus side, there was absolutely no one waiting in line, so we could walk right up to the table. On the downside, they had sold the majority of his books before the event started, so there were only a few choices left. I ended up buying a copy of Norse Mythology, which I had recently read and really enjoyed. All in all, it was quite a successful evening, and one I would gladly repeat.