American Gods by Neil Gaiman

Neil Gaiman is one of those writers who I should have read more of by this time, but never have. I have dabbled in Sandman (I read the first trade anyway) and some of his other comic book work, but somehow I just never got around to reading any of his books. Now, I am quite happy, that situation has been rectified!

On one hand, this is a rather simple review - and I’ll lay it out plainly - you should read American Gods. Being equal parts wonder and horror, with some road trip adventure thrown in for good measure, American Gods is a god's honest great American novel (no, no, not "the" great American novel, but a damned good one for sure). Populated with interesting characters that you actually care about, it is a wild ride through America. More than all that, it touches upon what America is... although, here I am slightly perplexed - somehow we have left it to a Brit to write such a quality piece American fiction? Sure, Gaiman now calls Minnesota home, but wow, this book actually "gets" a lot about what I think America is.

Then again (here’s my “on the other hand”) this is an incredibly tough review - there is so much to like, that it often seemed while reading it, I wanted this book to be multiple books. Gaiman does an admirable job of pulling it all together (and he does pull it all off as well), but I very much wish he could have spent more time exploring some of the more esoteric ideas (as with much of Speculative Fiction, ideas are important), places (the real and imaginary), and gods (oh boy, the gods make this book fun). So for me to get into one of the many many aspects (yep, there is a bunch I am not mentioning) of this book, I feel I should give equal time discussing too many things... this, to me, seems like such a monumental prospect that I am just going to leave it by saying - this is a book that will leave readers dreaming of more (and very likely different readers will find themselves wanting more of different elements present in this book), and that is a good thing.

OK, so here you are saying “great, but what’s the book about”? No? Good, because this is a very good book - it is about a lot, and it deserves you pick it up for gander and not let some book blogger tell you what it is all about.