Neverwhere

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Summary: Part Glory Road part Phantom Tollbooth
Review: When I was young, my parents worked in a large hospital complex in Chicago. There were miles of underground tunnels connecting these buildings, with all sorts of odd twists and turns and small doors that opened on areas full of pipes. I used to daydream about a clan of people that lived behind one of those doors, in the bowels of the hospital. I am not an author, but Neil Gaiman is, and he has written the story I wish I could tell. It is at times funny, sad, scary, and enchanting. It reminds me of Heinlein's Glory Road and Juster's The Phantom Tollbooth, and a series of vignettes called From A to Z in the Chocolate Alphabet that Harlan Ellison wrote in the window of A Change of Hobbit. "E," he said, 'is for elevator people...London is a city of steep, narrow stairways." Anyway, the only bad part of this book was that when it was finished, I was torn as to whether to lend it out (and to whom to lend it) and to reread it.

Rating:
Summary: Not exactly one to judge someones work...
Review: I'm not qualified to judge someone's work. I liked the book and think that Gaiman should write more like it. It's rare when a person get's to read something like this and feel like your part of the story, or maybe just a fly on the wall.

Rating:
Summary: WOW!
Review: My bold face intro says it all. This book was beyond excellent. It kept me up deep into the night, I couldn't put it down. If you like fantasy, you'll love this book. I'll be one of the first in line when STARDUST is released.

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Summary: A wonderful, dark and twisted sense of humor
Review: If you buy this book for anything, buy it for Croup and Vandemar! These two are the most deliciously demented characters I have run across in a long time. I've never found villains quite so entertaining (although, I must admit, in a dark and kind of horrific way) while being so very evilly competent. I loved all their wry comments. Their only downfall was some of the things they ate....

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Summary: Intelligent, dark, comedic - Like a gothic Hitchhiker's
Review: I know the Douglas Adams comparison is fairly obvious, but this English stranger in a strange land is a more decisive and layered non-hero...Richard feels less like a man always playing the fool, and more like an average, reasonably intelligent person trying not to look stupid when he finds himself in a world that is clearly out of his depths. The novel's sharp, dry wit crackles, and the narrative's insightfulness takes on a decidely less juvenile nature than Adams' Hitchhiker Trilogy, without losing any of the whimsy. Gaiman has obviously thought out more of this world than is revealed here, and has left plenty of room to develop the stories further, as one can only hope he shall. This is one of those books that you read in snatches for a few days, until one night you find yourself caught, reading far past your bedtime and into the waning hours of morning, knowing your alarm is about to go off for work, but still unable to break free of the spell. Every glimpse into the minds of the supporting characters leaves you yearning to know them better, and every allusion to a new facet of life in the shadow-realm of the London Underground leaves you hungering to explore deeper.

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Summary: Novel take on Mythic Underworld of London.
Review: This is the first Gaiman work I've read to date, and I was not disappointed. A very free-flowing story that unravels with interesting, although not fully-developed characters. The characters are not as important as the tapestry of London Below, which comes alive with Gaiman's well-contrived imagination. We have just as much fun as Mr. Croup and Mr. Vandemar, two characters best to be avoided in a dark alley, as we do with Richard Mayhew, newcomer to a world so different from his own. Gaiman has ample opportunity to return to Neverwhere in future works, and this is a great first book.

Rating:
Summary: Fun easy read... nothing more.
Review: What you would expect from Neil Gaiman if you've read almost all the comics book he collaborated on. Standard stock characters; with only minor changes the story could easily be part of the 'Books of Magic' or 'Sandman' series. Well written, I read it in one sitting. It would make great airplane fare. Reccomended for an easy read, but in no way memorable.

Rating:
Summary: The best book I have read in a long time
Review: I picked this book up at 4pm and just finished it. There was no way I could put it down! The characters were real, the plot was intricate, but it didn't get bogged down. If you read this, you will not be disappointed.

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Summary: Darkly whimsical, an "Alice in Wonderland" with a twist
Review: This book is about Richard Mayhew who is a normal boy in London Above one day and the next the world as he knows it is shattered when he helps a bleeding girl on the sidewalk. Richard, Door, Hunter, and the Marquis de Carabas set off on a journey to the angel Islington, to find out why Door's family was killed, and to get Richard back up to London Above. With the Marquis as a guide and Hunter as a bodygard they make their way around subway stations, sewers, and alleyways. Never knowing if Mr. Croup and Mr. Vandemar and going to pop out around the next bend, on their trechreous journey.

Rating:
Summary: Couldn't put it down!
Review: I read this book in about two days, I couldn't put it down! At the time I was backpacking through Europe so I really connected with the settings and descriptions of London underground. This is a great little fantasy book, the characters especially the bad guys are very creative! Great book for a rainy weekend.