American Gods: A Novel by Neil Gaiman Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of American Gods: A Novel
Book Review: Buy it now!
Summary: 5 Stars
I think people that write reviews are incredibly vain. :)
This was one of the best books I have ever read. I now know why people line up in droves to meet him.
But, as they say, there is no accounting for taste. I like to read the one star reviews for entertainment. I could only get part way thru most of them tho... blah blah blah... and got a headache before I could finish them. I don't think I have ever hated a book so much that I would waste time writing a bad review of it. Wait a second, I forgot about the Wheel of Time series. zzzzzz is that mess finished yet?
This was a great idea for a book that I thought I was incredibly entertaining and engaging. I loved the little short stories intertwined into the main story also. I will be reading it again and I look forward to reading more of his work.
Book Review: Character Filled
Summary: 4 Stars
The main character is a man called Shadow. He just made it out of prison and is excited to get home to his wife. Unfortunately, the night before he's released he finds out his wife died in a car accident with his best friend. Now Shadow has no ties to the real world, and he makes the acquaintance of a business man named Mr. Wednesday, who offers Shadow a job. Through Mr. Wednesday Shadow meets many strange and unusual people, but the funny thing is that Shadow seems to fit in with them.
I know there are a lot of metaphors and religious messages in this book, but don't look at me for what they are because I was not thinking that deeply while I read it. Mostly I enjoyed the book. The only time I didn't was when I felt I was supposed to know the people/Gods that Shadow or Mr. Wednesday were talking to. I felt a little confused at the ending; it felt like there was too many people in the pot.
As a character, I liked Shadow and related to him through most of the book except(warning this may spoil the ending for you) when he returns at the end. I just couldn't understand why he would come back after being done with the world. I just didn't see it happening.
In the end, I enjoyed the story and the characters, and I would read the sequels and short stories connected to American Gods.
Book Review: Classical Mythology meets New World Obsessions
Summary: 5 Stars
I have only ever read one other adult book ( I don't count Coraline) by Gaiman, which was vastly different from this book in both style and mood - Stardust. A friend recommended I read this book many years ago since I like mythology. I found this book really had not much to do with mythology in the classic sense. Instead the characters that were pulled from mythology, such as Odin, Anansi, Horus, Bast, and Ganesha, among others, behaved like has-been D-list celebrities that struggle to survive in a country that is repeatedly described as "...a bad land for gods." The powers they rarely put on display were minimal and amounted to the same kind of "magic" as a skilled pick-pocket, con-artist, or amateur magician. The few times any real power is observed is once during the sexual scene of a re-invented Queen of Sheba (I'll spare you the R-rated details) and when the gods travel "behind the scenes," a state of existence that only the gods can enter.
While the names of classical mythology fit into the category of the Old Gods, there are New Gods that have taken root in America, born from cultural obsessions that have evolved and devolved over the years, such as railroads - a man dressed as a railroad conductor, television - a voice talking through Lucille Ball on a rerun of I Love Lucy, vehicles - stocky men that seemed to resemble vehicles themselves, and internet - a short, nerdy, nervous kid, among other American fixations and stereotypes.
In addition, one of the scenic devices used throughout the plot is what Gaiman's characters describe as places of power - side-of-the-road dives that road-trippers visit for no apparent reason, such as a place boasting the largest doll collection in America or the biggest wheel of cheese. And no, Disneyworld is not one of them.
One of the things I found interesting about this Gaiman-born world is that the Old Gods only exist in the New World when regular people travel from other countries and bring their memories and practices with them, even when they don't intend to stay themselves. The gods are "born" from these average people, and even though they can be killed by others, they don't die otherwise, but instead alternately starve or thrive based on the behavior of the people who live and die in the New World. They all have counterpart manifestations of themselves in the countries they are pulled from, but one's existence does not affect the other - though they do seem to be aware of each other.
All of this is merely the background of the main plot, which centers around the activities and travels of a seemingly mortal man with a single name, Shadow. I never did "get" the one-name thing, but whatever. Through Shadow's narration, the reader learns of an impending storm - a battle between the Old Gods and New Gods, the former fighting for survival and the latter fighting for dominance. Shadow works for a mysterious "Mr. Wednesday" and is randomly haunted by his dead wife, Laura, but otherwise seems to have little drive of his own for most of the book. In fitting irony, he has his own brand of "magic" - an obsession for coin tricks to pass the time from his days spent in prison - which I could never really follow the descriptions of.
To be completely honest, I truly did enjoy this book, though I am struggling to say exactly why. Perhaps I was fascinated by the "shadowy" way that Gaiman told the story, or how he developed this over-the-hill world of gods and goddesses that better resembled America's middle and poor classes' struggles for survival, money, and influence. Some of the personal touches that Shadow's character added to the plot made him at times surprisingly endearing. In addition, the way that Shadow seemed to address the reader at the very end of the book was so satisfying that I laughed out loud and had to read it again several times. Something about that just brought the book to life for me and help me to fully appreciate the versatile style of Gaiman. This is one of those books you don't have to fully understand to fully appreciate.
Book Review: Clever ruse designed to lead people to atheism
Summary: 1 Stars
I'm going to queue up with the other one star reviewers. The book is basically about people with little class who seem to have incredibly small bladders as they are always having to take a "piss". One could make a drinking game with the number of times "piss" is used in the book. Gaiman also lets no meal, no matter how trivial or unrelated to the plot, pass unmentioned. Why is so much space taken up with the characters eating meal after meal while going from place to place? Surely we can be allowed to assume the characters eat enough to stay alive and don't need to be reminded of it every few paragraphs. Nope. I kept waiting for the gods to become more awe inspiring or evil or wise or something. Is it Gaiman's point that our gods can only be low class, shallow, foul-mouthed womanizers and whores since that reflects humanity as he sees it? There was little to nothing clever about the book outside the premise. American Gods still waits to be written.Book Review: Close, but not cigar
Summary: 4 Stars
Gaiman will truly make you rethink godhood and all about what "divine" is in his book. Even more, the feelings and images he evokes in some of its chapters make you feel as if you have lost something on the way to the modern era only to find it again, transformed, but nonetheless, equally powerful. Gods do change according to Gaiman, but their tricks and their ethos do not. This is a spectacular book which will plunge the reader into a sort of thriller/epic book that will force you to question the current "american way" of life and the "evolution" of traditions.
However, new readers to Gaiman should be aware that perhaps this is not the most recommendable book to start reading him since it is plagued with references to gods adored in the past and sometimes they are a little difficult to identify amongst the characters of the book, which might actually hinder the reader's understanding of why some characters do what they do. Also, for those who have read Gaiman already, the book is not nearly as good as the potrayal he did about gods in The Sandman series, so you might actually end up being a little dissapointed in the way Odin the All Father is displayed in this book compared to the way he was in the comic.
All in all, however, this is a great book. Just not as good as other titles in the Gaiman library.