Neverwhere

Rating:
Summary: Emily 16, Arlington,VA
Review: The book Neverwhere, by Neil Gailman is a great book. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes gory or science fiction books. I wouldn't recommend this book to any person who hates vulgar descriptions or people under intence pain. There are some pretty vivid parts of this book and they are not for everyone.

Neverwhere is about a man named Richard Mayhew, who lives in London, England. One day as he was going on a date with his fiance he stumbled across a girl, Door, that was hurt. He took Door to his apartment and helped her get well. After he had helped Door, he was strangely forgotton by everyone he knew, including his fiance. He could no longer live where he was so he talked to a beggar on the street about the girl he helped. The beggar than took him to another world which is called London Below. That is where the whole adventure is started.

The great part about this book is that something is always happening and you don't tale the time to understand it in the beginning you will never get it. Because this book is a slow read and very long I don't recommend it to someone who is impatient or on a real short deadline.

Another aspect of this book, and why it is so confusing at the beginning, is that it skips from character to character. At one minute you are reading about Richard and his adventures in London Below, the next minute you are reading about Door and her adventure somewhere totally different. Both of the adventures are happening simultaneously. This happens throughout the entire book and sometimes it skips between three or four characters. Although this is perplexing don't get distressed, you get the hang of keeping multiple stories of people in your head. All the characters meet and relate to the story so it isn't totally random. This shouldn't be a reason why you don't read the book because it keeps your mind from wandering and it really isn't that complicated.

I hope you like the book as much as I did. It is so highly acclaimed that you don't have to take my word for it. The author really captures the nature of the underground world snd it is hard to find a science fiction that relates to real life.

Rating:
Summary: Darkly Brilliant
Review: For those of us who are fans of Neil's earlier works, his unique combination of lyrical prose, gripping suspense, and wonderfully weird imagination is old news, but we never grow tired of reading it. Whenever I read a new short story of his, I rediscover what a strange and wonderful world this is. So when I began reading "Neverwhere," I was prepared, but I still got a shock. For any novel, it is first-rate. For a first novel, it is phenomenal.

The story centers around Richard Mayhew, a young man from London who stops to help a girl he finds bleeding in the street, and is drawn, against his will, into her world. London Below, a world of dark tunnels and strange people. At least, some of them are people. The girl is Door, who can open anything from a puzzle box to a blank wall, but can't unlock the mystery of who had her family killed, and why. Her companions are the Marquis de Carabas, who can get you anything you want in return for a favor, and Hunter, a predator among predators and an occasional bodyguard.

Back in our world, Richard is discovering that his ATM cards won't work, taxis won't stop for him, and unless he talks to someone directly, they won't even notice he's there, and if they do, their attention soon wanders and they forget that he's standing right in front of them. He has slipped into London Below, where the rats are kings, where the people who have fallen through the cracks of our world come, the lost and the forgotten. With Door, Hunter, and the Marquis, he embarks on a journey that will take him to places he's only seen in his nightmares.

From the first page to the last, this book held me so deeply in its thrall that I didn't leave my room for a day and a half, and then I ventured forth only for food, and I brought the book with me and read it at the table. "Neverwhere" was as far from what I expected it to be as "A Midsummer Night's Dream" is from "Curious George Goes To The Zoo." It has the temporary honor of being my favorite book (an often-changing position) and is sure to become a classic, not only in gothic fantasy, but in all literature.

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Summary: WTB: Editor
Review: The hook here is what got me: a vast underground (centered around the London Underground) composed of people and places that have "fallen through the cracks." I was more than willing to play along, but Gaiman's London Below does not seem to possess any internal rhyme or reason. The logic of who or what inhabits London Below seems to change depending on what new character or place pops into the author's head. There are allusions to Alice in Wonderland, Dante's Inferno, and Greek myth; some have even likened it to Adam's phenomenal Hitchhiker's trilogy, but to me, it plays as standard D&D fare: a quest composed of the one-dimensional archtypes fighter (Hunter), thief (marquis De Carabas), and elvin magician (Door) with a Willy Loman (Richard Mayhew) thrown in for good measure. In addition, there is some pretty heavy-handed foreshadowing and sloppy editing of the different sub-plots woven into the story that made me wince every once in a while. The first 100 pages could have been condensed into 10 by a decent editor, but from there, the story gets rolling along rather nicely as the reader's acceptance of Gaiman's world matches that of Richard - instead of questioning the next bizarre reality, you almost expect it. Though parts of Richard's character development are clichéd and predictable, it is paced nicely and believably. While I was not as taken with Gaiman's humor as other readers, he is a gifted storyteller nevertheless, as evidenced by the fact that I stayed up until 3am to finish the book despite its technical shortcomings. Overall, a great premise with some real promise, but I would have appreciated a tighter, more efficient package. I'd give it 3.5 stars if I could, but it'll have to do with a 3 to balance out all those 5s out there. :)

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful dark fantasy
Review: Neverwhere was one of those books that really sticks in my mind. I don't think I'll ever forget its characters and images. At heart it's a standard fish-out-of-water-turned-hero story, but Gaiman's dark humor and incredible imagination make it far from formulaic. This is the best novel I've read in a long time.

I wasn't a Neil Gaiman fan; I picked up Neverwhere because the jacket copy caught my eye. I've now read everything by Gaiman I can get my hands on, and it's almost all terrific.

This book would be great for kids 12 and older. It's intended for adults, but I would have loved it at that age.

Rating:
Summary: A COOL BOOK!
Review: I really enjoyed this book! Neil Gaiman had such an imagination! Anyway, the characters are so individual, and yes, it is exactly what a twisted Alice in Wonderland would be like! It's strange that I have not read Neil Gaiman's other works. But this was the first good read I've had for a while.

Rating:
Summary: Wow...
Review: When I read the synopsis of this book, I thought it looked kinda dumb. Boy, was I wrong. This is seriously one of the best books I've ever read. Very fast-paced, and a new and exciting event around every corner. The characters are incredibly well-developed as well. The story itself is marvelous. When you first come across the idea of people living in the London sewer system, it sounds ridiculous, but Gaiman successfully brings it to life. Neverwhere has a perfect blend of fantasy, horror, humor, and philosophy - sure to satisfy just about anybody. One of the reasons I loved it so much was because he was so good at writing one paragraph that had me cracking up, and the next paragraph I was getting up and making sure all the doors were locked. I couldn't put it down.

Rating:
Summary: owed a tremendous debt to Christopher Fowler
Review: Neil Gaiman, the renowned creator of The Sandman comic book, makes his solo novelist debut with this entertaining, though derivative, dark fantasy.

Richard Mayhew has come to London to make his way in the world. He works as a securities analyst & he's become engaged. He's a decent kind-hearted soul who never passes a beggar without digging out some change. Then one night on the way to dinner with his fiancee, the tatterdemalion who he stops to help turns out to be an injured young girl named Door. He takes her back to his apartment & shortly is visited by Mr. Croup & Mr. Vandemar, two vicious looking men in Victorian dress. He is unable to stop them from searching the apartment, but they do not find Door. When she comes out of hiding, she asks him to carry a message for her. He agrees & goes to fetch the mysterious marquis de Carabas, who takes Door away.

With these odd people out of his life, Richard tries to resume his life, but discovers that he has become a non-person. His bank card doesn't work, friends don't recognize him & many people don't even appear to see him. He sets out to try to find out what happened & ends up in London Below, a bizarre city that exists in some kind of parallel reality beneath the streets of the City. Finding Door and de Carabas, he joins them in a quest to destroy the Beast of London and find the angel Islington.

It seemed to me that Gaiman's story owed a tremendous debt to Christopher Fowler, but Fowler is largely unknown here & Gaiman's book made various best-of lists, so more power to him.

GRADE: B

Rating:
Summary: no underground travell will ever be the same again
Review: tube, u-bahn, metro or subway. they will never seem the same. neither will beggers, street music or anybody that 'fell through the cracks'. we all notice dark underground cabins and stops the train never pools into. Geiman uses them as a playground. the best book i have read for some time!!

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Summary: Well crafted Novel that delves into human-ness
Review: First off let me say that I gave this book 4 stars only because I believe that Lord of The Rings is the scale upon which all other fantasy novels should be weighed. This book came very close to 5 stars in my book. Mr. Gaiman is a master-storyteller, as evidenced in this book. The London subway system, the 'rarely seen' people who blend into the cracks because we choose not to see these people (the poor, outcast, homeless, etc.).

The book is full of interesting characters and an excellent twist at the end. I suspected certain things before I got the end of the novel but was pleasantly surprised by the way the author tweaked my mind.

If you are a lover of Fantasy and/or Science Fiction, this book comes highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: It's Neil Gaiman
Review: Very very nice book, with a very imaginative universe created. Sometimes it gives you the wish to go to London just to see the undergrounds.

Looks a lot with a comic series story, but hey, it's Neil Gaiman. :)