…so says Neil Gaiman, who was the keynote speaker at the Fantasy Matters Conference this weekend in Minneapolis. He read the opening chapter of his new (as-yet-unfinished) novel The Graveyard Book, which was really quite charming, spooky, and lovely.

I gave a scholarly presentation on Peter Jackson and Hayao Miyazaki, and I was very glad that it went well and took exactly twenty minutes, allowing eight minutes for questions and two minutes to rush across the hall to arrive in time for Neil’s talk.

Other highlights of the conference were various scholarly papers on fairy tales, on Gaiman’s use of “estranged fantasy,” and on Pan’s Labyrinth, plus a selection of books to buy from DreamHaven, and very nice danishes and sweet rolls.

After my friend Kelly gave a reading, I headed with some friends to the Caspian Bistro, one of the best Persian restaurants in the Twin Cities. I had delicately-flavored saffron rice with onions and barberries, and really good (and vegetarian!) stuffed grape leaves. The Caspian has an attached marketplace, where we bought baklava, flatbread and spices.

The only unfortunate part of the conference was the part where I was supposed to drive home, realized that I’d left my car sitting in the parking lot all day with its lights on, and had to call a tow truck to get a jump. But even that wasn’t so bad, since there was leftover saffron rice to enjoy when I finally got home.