Neil Gaiman works

"By far my favorite of Gaiman's works (and also, in my opinion, the best novel of the century to date)."

Come again?

I read American Gods (which I liked) after reading Good Omens (which I loved). I tried to read Anansi Boys as well, but I had to give it up because I just couldn't take all the bad things happening to the main character.

He gets better. Hell, he's the one who gets the coolest power his father had, not his brother.

Edit: I would say that Gaiman's best work is probably The Tragical Comedy or Comical Tragedy of Mr. Punch, but that's a comic book and not well-known as The Sandman.

edited 13th Dec '11 6:39:10 AM by Fancolors

Does he get better, or do things go better for him? Because there's a big difference right there.

Both.

I just recently finished Good Omens.

It was okay. I don't think it lives up to all of the hype but I don't regret reading it.

I also recently acquired Neverwhere, so I'll be reading that.

Good Omens gets a lot of hype. As does Discworld, for that matter.

Much as I love both, I try not to over-hype them. I don't want to be part of the problem.

Haha, I and other people who can't stand hype would like to thank you XD

I like Discworld, what I've read at least. need to finish that series...

I'm glad people hype things, honestly. Sure it's annoying when you're not a fan, but checking out over-hyped series is what drew my attention to some of my favorite things.

edited 13th Dec '11 2:13:16 PM by Bluespade

Well I finally finished American Gods. Gonna have to say it really wasn't worth the time for me. The actual prose was very good, and the characters very well written. But I got hit with the Eight Deadly Words about halfway through and never really recovered. Neither side really seems to be worth rooting for, and Shadow himself just wanders around doing either what he's told or something that makes no sense at all. Also, there is way too much lazy plotting, inconsistencies, and all around plot holes for me to really enjoy it.

I had high hopes for Mr. Gaiman too. Oh well, I'll give him another try some time.

Oh, and am I the only one who would have preferred a whole book about the dark secret of Lakeside? That part at least was very intriguing.

edited 15th Dec '11 12:35:11 PM by Bluespade

I've loved everything of Gaiman's I've read except for Anansi Boys, which was good but just didn't click with me like everything else did.

Hm that's interesting because I actually preferred Anansi Boys to American Gods. That isn't to say that America was bad, it was just darker than a lot of the fare I usually read. I enjoyed the lighter aspects of Anansi Boys and the examination of Fat Charlie's relationship with his father.

Thanks, fancolors, for pointing out my mistake. I'm not exactly sure where my mind was when I was typing up my post.

edited 15th Dec '11 4:11:16 PM by Drenius

'Tony'?

At The Simpsons, apparently.

One thing that struck me about Anansi Boys is that Grahame Coats with all his cliches comes off as a Discworld transplant.

Hm. Have read Stardust. Was nice story.

Am reading Smoke And Mirrors. Is breathtaking. As in, it's as if a voiced had murmured to me something terrible about myself, that I hadn't noticed yet. I only know two other authors that made me feel this way: Dino Buzzati (look for "il colombre") and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Jorge Luis Borges, on the other hand, kind of failed at that, though he was very clever and enjoyable in his own way.

No, really, his talent shines the most with short stories, where the reader is assumed to understand the rules of the setting. In longer works, he has to actually explain stuff, and that sort of spoils the magic.

I actually finished Neverwhere today. it was a nice little piece of Urban Fantasy.

The only thing that I wasn't happy with was that Richard went back at the end. I kind of wanted him to stay in regular London, and the very end where he makes a door with that knife and goes back seemed...I don't know. Unfitting somehow. I'm probably missing some sort of deep philosophical point or something.

I dunno about a deep philosophical point, but I liked that part because it made more sense to me that Richard would want to stay in the magical world where he's a respected badass than the mundane world where he's a nobody.

I just went to a local bookstore and it had the original, untranslated version of Good Omens. What a bad time to run out of money.

I liked Anansi Boys more than either American Gods or Good Omens. Mind, all of them were very entertaining; but I felt that American Gods and Good Omens tried a bit too hard — they were clever, definitely, but they were far too self-aware for my tastes.

Another issue I had with AG is that it felt way too drawn out. I think it could have been a hundred pages shorter or more.

Neverwhere is excellent. Easily in my top 5 books.

I'm a big fan, and certainly feel that Sandman is his magnum opus. American Gods, Neverwhere Stardust, Good Omens and some of his short stories such as Murder Mysteries and A Study in Emerald are on the next level down for me.

I was also pleasantly surprised by Graveyard Book, that was a really solid effort. Eventually I'll have to finally read Coraline.

edited 1st Jun '12 12:32:25 AM by TheWanderer

In my opinion, Coraline is excellent. (Though if I were you, I'd read it when it's light outside.)

My husband has Anansi Boys. I'll definitely read it some time.

Is it all the horrifying moments? Those are what I keep hearing about this book and the movie.

Indeed. The book was the scariest thing I'd read in a while (and I was well over age twenty at the time).

The film is less scary than the book (IMO), but it's still fairly creepy, especially towards the end.