This tower, patched unevenly with black ivy, arose like a mutilated finger from among the fists of knuckled masonry and pointed blasphemously at heaven. At night the owls made of it an echoing throat; by day it stood voiceless and cast its long shadow. —Me

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—a description of the Tower of Flints, part of the aging castle Gormenghast, from Mervyn Peake’s Gothic fantasy “Titus Groan.”

Neil Gaiman and Akiva Goldman are bringing a series based on the unfinished novels to Showtime.