Maybe my expectations were just too high. I've read very little Gaiman but I've always liked the guy's personality and I figured Stardust would be a quick introduction to modern fantasy (which I read nearly none of). The sort of Victorian dramatic angle was right up my alley.
But this was a really awful read. The writing is amateurish and immature, I suppose because the novel attempts to be a sort of new fairy tale. But this fairy tale is just boring; instead of deconstructing or playing around with these super, super common tropes, they are played completely straight. There is not a single hint of originality. The dialogue is irregular and anachronistic. It's a horrible Frankensteinish monster that might have been invented by a twelve-year-old who's just seen Lord of the Rings and maybe half of some Victorian period drama and decided that they must create.
There are two strong points: (1) it's very atmospheric and a lot of the description is nice and (2) the ending is a really clever subversion of Happily Ever After and is genuinely sweet. I wish he'd troped as creatively in the rest of the freakin' book, because then this would've been fantastic instead of...shitty. Oh, and the first chapter with the weird elf sex scene is fine. 1/5
Stardust (Novel) Extremely Disappointing 1/5
Maybe my expectations were just too high. I've read very little Gaiman but I've always liked the guy's personality and I figured Stardust would be a quick introduction to modern fantasy (which I read nearly none of). The sort of Victorian dramatic angle was right up my alley.
But this was a really awful read. The writing is amateurish and immature, I suppose because the novel attempts to be a sort of new fairy tale. But this fairy tale is just boring; instead of deconstructing or playing around with these super, super common tropes, they are played completely straight. There is not a single hint of originality. The dialogue is irregular and anachronistic. It's a horrible Frankensteinish monster that might have been invented by a twelve-year-old who's just seen Lord of the Rings and maybe half of some Victorian period drama and decided that they must create.
There are two strong points: (1) it's very atmospheric and a lot of the description is nice and (2) the ending is a really clever subversion of Happily Ever After and is genuinely sweet. I wish he'd troped as creatively in the rest of the freakin' book, because then this would've been fantastic instead of...shitty. Oh, and the first chapter with the weird elf sex scene is fine. 1/5