Neverwhere

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Summary: Sorry about the confusion
Review: this a good book. it is reaeally good fool. It is like fantasy, but not really. it is good. it is a good book that is good and it is a book, see, it is a good book and i liked this book beacuse it was a book that was a good book that was good.

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Summary: Gaiman is a Pro at Weaving Worlds You Get Lost In
Review: I read American Gods last year and loved it, eager to read what else the author of the fabulous "Sandman" graphic novels has written, I picked up Neverwhere and read it in a day.

Here, Gaiman takes the real life "London Underground" system of subways and tube stations and adds a twist, a magical world beyond the underground, London Below where pockets of lost time and places are filled with the forgotten people of the world.

London Below is a world of Baronies and Fiefdoms, of angels, beasts and killers. Richard Mayhew, a securities analyst gets drawn into this secret, invisible world when he helps what appears to be an injured homeless woman. Because of his contact with her and some of the people from her world, he slowly disappears from his own reality. It seems that most people aboveground cannot deal with the reality of London Below so they conveniently can't see them or anything they do.

A classic quest follows with an interesting cast of characters. Richard and The Lady Door, together with a reprobate Marquis and a bodyguard head off through danger to find answers. You enter the world of rat speakers, sewer dwellers and secret societies. It's all very interesting and funny as well as giving the reader the occasional scare. Below is a world where nothing is what it seems and danger lurks everywhere and yet, its inhabitants seem to derive pleasure from their lives despite that.

As with Gods, Gaiman weaves his mythical world into the tapestry of the "reality" of every day life and there are times when you aren't sure if what is happening is just a manifestation of Richard's insanity or not. It's a nice tension.

This book will please the fantasy reader as well as those who love a good mystery. It's a worthy read.

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Summary: Down the rabbit hole into London Underground
Review: Alice meets the Wizard of Oz - and you'll never want to leave the underground.

This was an amazing book! Living in NYC it made me really think about those random "dead ends" and the gap between the subway and the platform. (an idea that I am sure JK Rowling got from Neil...)

I really wanted to visit the London Underground (and I don't mean the subway) after reading this delightful and absorbing novel. The characters were well written and memorable.

This was one of the best books I have read in ages. I could not put it down and began to re-read it the moment I finished! Neil Gaiman not only has a fantastic imagination, he also has a great sense of humor and we are just so lucky that he has decided to share them and his amazing talent with us. I can't wait to read Stardust!

If you read one book this year - read this one. A magical, mysterious romp in a world you can only hope really exists. My next vacation is going to be to London Underground.

Pick this book up and I promise you will not want to put it down.

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Summary: The London You Will Never See
Review: Mr. Gaiman writes in a genre all his own (though I did read a story about the Rat King and his son saving the world from the Pied Piper, which is sort of along the lines Mr. Gaiman writes). This is a story of London underground and the lost people who live there. The interesting part is that the hero is some ordinary bloke, who does not act like a hero, or trys to be a hero, but the essence of heroism is that he is there and is true to his people.

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Summary: Dark fantasy at highest level
Review: Neverwhere is a dark fantasy at its highest level. Richard Mayhew ceases to exist in the London that we know and finds himself in the dark, dangerous, magical London Below. Here, he finds creatures and people and places and begins a quest which will lead him to face dangers everywhere. An adult, dark fantasy which reads from page to page at superb speed. A great work from Neil Gaiman

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Summary: Master of the icon
Review: Neil Gaiman understands the iconography of our modern world more deeply than any modern writer. He starts with a set of symbols we think we understand, then redefines them and presents them to us in such a stunning new light that the reader comes away wondering why they missed what should have been perfectly obvious. In this book he takes that same magic touch and applies it to the London Underground. Subway trains, we learn, hold the high court of an aging, eccentric baron. Empty rooms are bound together by magic doors and lived in by people of such high noble standing that even the angels envy them. That drunken beggar sleeping on the platform turns out to be the loyal retainer of a high prince.

After you read this book you will never again look at a subway train the same way. Neil Gaiman has mastered something few writers ever learn: ficiton changes the way we see our world.


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Summary: Good Urban Fantasy
Review: I read this book after reading Gaiman's AMERICAN GODS. I appreciate Gaiman's style and the homage that he pays to the roots of urban fantasy in his books. I did feel, however, that despite his skill he is missing something in the content of his fantasy, and that ultimately NEVERWHERE tries to do in one book and not enougth ink what Charles DeLint has done more effectively and more gradually in several books. The story and characters squashed into NEVERWHERE could easily have made three or four interesting books if Gaiman had fleshed them out a little more. Gaiman paints an interesting underground London universe in NEVERWHERE and, while I enjoyed the book, I felt that it ended before I was satisfied. There's a lot more meat there, and Gaiman has only let his readers taste a few bites of it. Keep going... I think that Gaiman's urban fantasy could rival DeLint's if he kept at it--and it would be a more modern urban fantasy minus some of the celtic mumbo jumbo that DeLint seems to think so necessary.

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Summary: Touching and Exciting--A Wonderful Read
Review: Neil Gaiman is a very artful storyteller, with just enough wit to make you smile, but never so much that it takes away from his plot or characters. In that sense, I do believe he finally outshines Douglas Adams who was always most concerned about dazzling with cleverness.

This novel is hard to put down. When you're done, you will have fallen in love with the characters and wish that there was a sequel for you to follow their continuing adventures. The style is clean and direct, the tone something like a Tim Burton production--colorful and interesting and slightly sinister.

For fans of fun stories, endearing characters and wry humor, this is for you. Also highly recommended are the aforementioned Douglas Adams and Robert Asprin.

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Summary: Thank Goodness Someone took the mantle!
Review: Feeling woeful having exhausted the Douglas Adams books and Tom Robbins, I spent time reading lesser books by lesser writers. Having read Sandman occasionally, then spreading to other "graphic" novels by Gaiman, I found Neverwhere! Humorous, intelligent and captivating!! This writer creates a story that does not leave you! You will not want to put this down, but if you must for some reason, the depth, texture and details remain so vivid that you will not miss a step when you revisit the story. Some othe readers will speak of gaps or this being a "rough draft", I challenge them! This book offers mysteries, answers, fables, intrigue and a wonderful ride! I am addicted and so pleased that he is young! More to come!

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Summary: Mind the gaps. . .
Review: In the mid eighteen hundreds, an author named Henry Mayhew traveled London's streets gathering life stories from real beggars, thieves, prostitutes and other humble folks and criminals ordinarily ignored and avoided by those outside their invisible underclass. Mayhew compiled their first-person testimonies into a huge, oral history project focusing on their degradation and the desperate circumstances in which they existed, his real life characters rivaling those in fictional works by Dickens.

Surely Neil Gaiman is paying homage to Henry Mayhew with the surname of his unassuming protagonist who explores an underworld he never realized was there before -- a thoughtful touch. And I like the blatantly expressive, funny names Gaiman has chosen, in the manner of Dickens, to suit his characters. I love the mix of subtle details and over-the-top silliness. I love the way Gaiman, without showing off by explaining too much, plants entertaining bits through the tale, and I appreciate how well the story holds together despite my missing some.

Roller coastering through Gaiman's London in Neverwhere reminds me of experiencing Mark Helprin's New York in Winter's Tale and gives me similar enjoyment. Readers who require the journey to make sense may not derive the same thrills, but I delight in the effortless ride through London Above and London Below.

The same way beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, the success of this sort of tale depends not only on readers' receptivity to the genre , but also partly what each of us brings to it, the connections and associations it has for us, just as reading the same poems may charm some readers but repel others. Of course, that's how literature generally works, but Neverwhere is especially that kind of story.