It’s been quiet for Neil Gaiman since he faced seven allegations of sexual misconduct, but Redditors believe a new bombshell is about to drop, and Hugo Award finalist editor Vox Day reminds science fiction and fantasy fans that Gaiman has had a pattern of the kind of behavior he’s been accused of.
Neil Gaiman has been accused of sexual conduct by seven women, the first two starting with the Tortoise podcast, an investigative journalism outlet named for the Tortoise and the Hare fable, leaning toward “slow and steady wins the race.” They are well-known for doing deep dives on situations and gathering all the information to ensure accuracy before reporting.
During their first round of podcasts on Neil Gaiman, they revealed two women who accused the American Gods author of sexual assault—one who was his granddaughter’s age and acting as the babysitter/nanny of his child at the time. Neil Gaiman responded by saying they only cuddled in a bathtub, making the situation sound suspicious.
A third woman came out by revealing her therapy sessions after years of alleged manipulation by Gaiman, but then Tortoise revealed fourth and fifth accusers with very similar stories. The last may be the worst of all, as the woman alleges that Neil Gaiman blackmailed her by forcing her to do sexual acts in exchange for maintaining a place to live for her and her three daughters on his New York Estate.
The sixth woman who came out was the former massage therapist of Amanda Palmer, who detailed how Neil Gaiman flashed her in one of their appointments and implied a longer intimate relationship resulting from it based on manipulation from the Good Omens author.
In one of the Tortoise podcasts, one of the victims mentioned there were fourteen women Gaiman’s ex-wife Amanda Palmer was aware of who had this kind of story about his abuse. It’s increasingly like this is the case with a seventh allegation of The Sandman creator’s creepy behavior.
The seventh accusation against Gaiman came secondhand on Reddit, when a Redditor with the username EllieGeizler dropped the bombshell, “Unfortunately, yes, him, too. A friend of a friend stayed overnight in his house and he warned her that he might wander on Ambien. She woke up to find him in her room and she didn't go into specifics but she was upset and it was implied that he was groping her. She didn't want to hurt her career so she never shared it publicly. I'm just waiting for something worse to eventually come out about him. Don't pin your hopes on him being a squeaky-clean guy.”
Now it looks like the situation is going to get worse, as Hugo Award finalist editor and acclaimed epic fantasy author of A Throne Of Bones, Vox Day, has posted to his blog on the topic, “It appears the next chapter in the ongoing Neil Gaiman sexual assault scandal is about to begin. From r/NeilGaimanUncovered:"
“This is a heads-up as promised (and the last update) before the long-awaited article. We are only a few days away from publication. The article will be posted in this sub as soon as it’s out and we’ll include trigger warnings so vulnerable members can engage with highly disturbing content on their terms.”
He also posted a reminder that women have been warning about these allegations for years prior to the Tortoise Podcast doing their investigative journalism piece. His examples site:
2018: If you think Neil Gaiman is a great novelist, or even a great SF/F novelist, you are simply wrong. He is a successful, talented and much-loved SF/F author, and understandably so, but he is also little more than a very successful stunt writer with two or three tricks in his bag. There is a reason that all of his notable books involve mythology of one sort or another; his true gift is translating ancient myth into a form that pleases postmodern palates.
2017: It is right and proper to judge the artist on the basis of the art. More often than not, the art created by the artist provides relevant insight into his psyche; it is very difficult to write the opposite sex well and it is also very difficult for a man to write characters who are different than his own socio-sexual rank. Read Louis L’Amour and Robert Ludlum. Then read John Scalzi and Neil Gaiman. The difference is readily observable. Then read Piers Anthony and Marion Zimmer Bradley. Notice the creep factor? Exactly. This is one area where you can reliably trust your feelings.
2013: Neverwhere, Stardust, American Gods and Anansi Boys are written by the exact same man. It’s that Mr. Stock Type shows up for all four, each iteration as dull and insufferable as the last, distinguishable only faintly by his name. Leaving American Gods and Stardust alone for now, this isn’t so much a matter of “oh you could do this to any fantasy book,” itself an asinine proposition, because not all fantasy books feature a timid Londoner devoid of ambition who has relationship troubles with a demanding sweetheart/fiancee. The sweethearts in question(respectively Rosie Noah, Jessica, and Victoria Forrester) are likewise identical: thinly written, demanding, henpecking, and not the brightest. Really Gaiman kind of sucks at writing women, and apart from this one incredibly tertiary character in American Gods I don’t think he’s particularly comfortable with gay men–certainly not enough to write them as protagonists. Similarly, the catalyst to “finding the secret magic world” is always more or less the same: through colliding with one of said secret world’s inhabitants.
With so many coming out against Neil Gaiman already, and his online social media presence having been scrubbed for months, the author appears to have resigned himself to disappearing from the public eye entirely during this crisis. As of this date, he he has not publicly made any comments addressing the allegations in close to a year of them being on the internet.
While the contents of this new alleged article are as of yet unknown, the pattern of behavior already established by allegations for The Sandman creator show a very troubled history.
What do you think of the possibility of a new bombshell expose dropping on The Sandman creator Neil Gaiman? Leave a comment and let us know.
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Been waiting for the next chapter in this sordid tale to appear. Can you say "Creep"? I thought that you could.
Well he has the right politics. So they will do everything they can to help him cover it and get away with it. Just imagine about the sick freaks we never hear about.