Neil Gaiman on longer works

If you don't know Neil Gaiman, know that he's a superb sci-fi/fantasy writer.

He also has an uncanny knack for social media including a well-written and well-read blog and about 100k followers on twitter. On his blog he regularly answers questions submitted by fans, which is totally cool for a popular writer to do!

I've sent a number of questions to Gaiman. The penultimate question I sent, that wasn't answered, was inspired by a layover in the Salt Lake City airport and asked about how Gaiman decides what book to buy in an airport bookstore. I get the feeling that the answer--he doesn't buy books in airports--was just too obvious.

Recently I actually had one answered!:

Hiya,

So, you clearly have novels in you. But do you have something longer in you?

I've recently become a fan of sorts of heptalogies (seven book works). Harry Potter is the most obvious example but the two I've recently read that struck me as pure masterpieces are King's Dark Tower series and Weiss and Hickman's Death Gate Cycle.

I have a sinking suspicion that the best work from you will come after wrestling with stories and themes that might only fit in a longer work.

Something like the ten volume (or twelve, or fifteen volume, depending on which spin-off books you count), 2,500-plus-page-vastness of Sandman, you mean?

Yep, I can do that.

No, no real plans ever to do it again. But you never know: if I wind up starting a story that I realise demands that kind of length, I'll write it at that length. Certainly, in the decade since I finished Sandman I've really enjoyed not writing multi-volume epics.

Ouch.

It's hard writing these kinds of questions such that they're interesting and provocative enough to elicit an answer but also demonstrate the respect I have for the craft. And I can imagine answering questions from legions of fans can be even tougher and mind-numbing.

I guess I didn't get across my central point: that I was asking about longer novels, not graphic works. I'm not sure why that makes a difference to me but I often prefer a low picture-to-text ratio with my sci-fi/fantasy (although a ratio of zero is usually not ideal).

The thing that has struck me about the longer series I've read is that each of them seem to be the writer's masterpiece (the two mentioned above along with Harry Potter and the Dune series are shining examples of very well done series of novels).

And I guess what I meant to ask Gaiman is more along the lines of: what form do you think your masterpiece will take? Do you think you've already penned it? Does a masterpiece necessarily have to be long or is yours more succinct? Is it even a novel?

And something I didn't get across is that I have this innate feeling that a Gaiman series of the caliber of King's Dark Tower books would probably set the high-water mark for interesting sci-fi/fantasy for our time.

But it sounds like he thinks differently, and that's just fine too.