Frank Buckley Interviews…

Turns out that Frank Buckley, the news anchor at KTLA 5, is not just a really great guy (evident from his manner on TV), but also a really excellent interviewer with a sharp curiosity that gives me hope that great journalism is still alive, well, and in good hands. I showed up at the station expecting to just have a pleasant chat around the book and be done with it, but I walked into the room and he’d done all his research and was sitting with extensive notes and so forth about lots of physics ideas he’d read in the book that he wanted to talk about! So we have a blast talking about the physics of our universe and the world around us in some in-depth detail. It was fantastic, and just the kind f conversation I hope that the book celebrates and inspires people to have!

Check out our interview here (embed below), and be sure to tune in to his […] Click to continue reading this post

North Carolina Science Fair!

Tomorrow I’ll be giving a talk at the North Carolina Science Festival! The talk will be about black holes, time, space, movies, and books, held inside the historic Morehead planetarium. I’ll sign the book for you after if you want.
Here is a link to the event.

(On the plane over, rather than doing my usual sketch-a-face-from-a-magazine exercise you might be familiar with from earlier posts, e.g. here, I made some new sketches for use in the talk. One of those is above.)

-cvj Click to continue reading this post

An LA Times Piece…

It seems appropriate somehow that there’s an extensive interview with me in the LA Times with Deborah Netburn about my work on the book. Those of you who have read it might have recognised some of the landscape in one of the stories as looking an awful lot like downtown Los Angeles, and if you follow the conversation and pay attention to your surroundings, you see that they pass a number of LA Landmarks, ultimately ending up very close to the LA Times Building, itself a landmark!

(In the shot above, you see a bit of the Angel’s Flight railway.)

Anyway, I hope you enjoy the interview! We talk a lot about the motivations for making the book, about drawing, and – most especially – the issue of science being for everyone…

[For those of you trying to get the book, note that although it is showing out of stock at Amazon, go ahead and place your order. Apparently they are getting the book and shipping it out constantly, even though it might not stop showing as out of stock. Also, check your local bookstores… Several Indys and branches of Barnes and Noble do have copies on their shelves. (I’ve checked.) Or they can order it for you. Also, the publisher’s site is another source. They are offering a 50% discount as thank you for being patient while they restock. There’s a whole new batch of books being printed and that will soon help make it easier to grab.]

-cvj Click to continue reading this post

Press Play!

Happy New Year!

Yesterday, the NPR affiliate KCRW’s Press Play broadcast an interview with me. I spoke with the host Madeleine Brand about my non-fiction graphic novel about science, and several other things that came up on the spur of the moment. Rather like one of the wide-ranging conversations in the book itself, come to think of it…

This was a major interview for me because I’ve been a huge fan of Madeleine for many years, going back to her NPR show Day to Day (which I still […] Click to continue reading this post

The Geometry Door

Now that #thedialoguesbook is out is I get even more people telling me how they can’t draw. I don’t believe them. Just as with science (and other subjects), everybody has a doorway in to a subject. It is just a matter of taking time to finding your individual Door. Individual doors is what makes us all wonderfully different. For me it is mostly geometry that is my Door. It gives a powerful way to see things, but isn’t the only way. Moreover, I have to work hard to not be trapped by it sometimes. But it is how I truly see things most often – through geometry. Wonderful geometry everywhere.

-cvj Click to continue reading this post

Two Events!


(Image above courtesy of Cellar Door Books in Riverside, CA.)

Happy Thanksgiving! This coming week, there’ll be two events that might be of interest to people either in the Los Angeles area, or the New York area.

The first is an event (Tues. 28th Nov., 7pm, Co-sponsored by LARB and Chevalier’s Books) centered around my new book, the Dialogues. It is the first such LA event, starting with a chat with writer and delightful conversationalist […] Click to continue reading this post

Henry Jenkins Interview (Complete)

All the parts of my interview with Henry Jenkins have been posted now. You can find them here, here, and here. The latest, posted today, talks about a nod to the superhero genre that I playfully do in the book, as well as my slightly unhealthy obsession over architectural details in the making of the book! (But of course, you knew that from reading this blog regularly…!)

-cvj

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Henry Jenkins Interview!

Just after waking up today I read Henry Jenkins’ introduction to an interview that he did with me, posted on his fascinating blog (Confessions of an ACA-Fan: about culture, media, communication, and more). I was overcome with emotion for a moment there – He is very generous with his remarks about the book! What a great start to the day!

I recommend reading the interview in full. Part one is up now. It is a very in-depth […] Click to continue reading this post

A Sighting!

I went a bit crazy on social media earlier today. I posted this picture and: There’s been a first sighting!! Aaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrgh! It EXISTS! It actually exists! In a bookstore (Cellar Door Books in Riverside)! (But believe it or not a copy has not got to me yet. Long story.) http://thedialoguesbook.com … Click to continue reading this post

Almost Time…

In another universe, this post has me holding the physical book, finally, after 18 years. In this universe however, there have been delays, and I’m holding this card showing the cover instead. But in 11 days let’s see! Pre-orders are enormously helpful. If you’ve already got a copy, thanks. But it’s gift-giving season coming up, so… Or just please share this post to others who might be interested in science and/or graphic books! Thanks. Ordering info, a trailer, and ten sample pages are here: http://thedialoguesbook.com

-cvj Click to continue reading this post

In Flight…

Over on Instagram – follow me there @asymptotia for lots of activity – I showed a couple of montages of sketches I did on the flight out to New Orleans and on the return portion. It is a bit of practice I like to do, which I have not done in a long time. It is part of the practice I did a lot when I was gearing up to do final drawing on the book:


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