hardcover, 736 pages
Published Oct. 25, 2016 by William Morrow.
One of the best modern life mythos imho, bought the paper version
Highly recommended to listen to the audiobook version. It’s fantastic.
Entertaining - not a bad thing to say about it.
I don't get the 'either you love it or you hate it' from other reviews; it is not controversial, not too long and not badly written.
Might be more alluring to people living in the USA, though.
This book combines a great premise and a great setting. It's filled with characters that all have interesting quirks (mostly due to many of them being gods), and there's lots of really fun episodes in the book. There's a twist, there's a climax, there's a love story and there's a journey. There's lots of things to like, and I really understand those who love this book.
So I feel like I have to defend not loving this book, as it does so many things right. It's a fine book, and I liked reading it. But maybe it just doesn't resonate as much with me as with others? I'm sure Shadow's (lack of) personality was intentional, but it doesn't make for an interesting journey to follow. The people he meet are all intersting, but they seldom evolve beyond the side characters that they are. The grand scheme turns out to not …
This book combines a great premise and a great setting. It's filled with characters that all have interesting quirks (mostly due to many of them being gods), and there's lots of really fun episodes in the book. There's a twist, there's a climax, there's a love story and there's a journey. There's lots of things to like, and I really understand those who love this book.
So I feel like I have to defend not loving this book, as it does so many things right. It's a fine book, and I liked reading it. But maybe it just doesn't resonate as much with me as with others? I'm sure Shadow's (lack of) personality was intentional, but it doesn't make for an interesting journey to follow. The people he meet are all intersting, but they seldom evolve beyond the side characters that they are. The grand scheme turns out to not be that interesting, and as it's revealed, everything kind of just blows over, and that's that. I liked that the book was slow, and focused more on the little things than the big picture. I loved how it used myths, and the universe that's created. It all made for a nice read - but not much more (to me). I might be a bit harsh, but this is a big book with quite a reputation, so I expected more from it than what it delivered. I did like it though, and I do reccomend reading it for anyone who is on the fence.
4.0 stars
Thoroughly enjoyed this book. I purchased it in an Amazon sale for 99p. I think it was worth more!
Listening to the 10th anniv. audio edition.
A decent story overall, but gets a little too douchy and pretentious at times.
This is one of those books that I enjoyed reading for the most part, only it didn't blow me away. I feel the premise of the story was promising, the idea of gods kind of getting lost in the translation of the modern era, mankind bowing down to worship technology and media, only the actual execution of the story was both weak and perversely heavy handed. It almost felt like it built up, built up, built up then fizzled out. Sort of like the weatherman on TV when a snowstorm is imminent. They hype and hype how this snowstorm is going to dump massive amounts of snow, cripple the city, blizzard conditions, state of emergency blah blah and then we get a measly 4 inches. That's kind of how this book felt to me. I kept waiting for this massive, world changing storm to hit, gods smiting gods, humans as …
This is one of those books that I enjoyed reading for the most part, only it didn't blow me away. I feel the premise of the story was promising, the idea of gods kind of getting lost in the translation of the modern era, mankind bowing down to worship technology and media, only the actual execution of the story was both weak and perversely heavy handed. It almost felt like it built up, built up, built up then fizzled out. Sort of like the weatherman on TV when a snowstorm is imminent. They hype and hype how this snowstorm is going to dump massive amounts of snow, cripple the city, blizzard conditions, state of emergency blah blah and then we get a measly 4 inches. That's kind of how this book felt to me. I kept waiting for this massive, world changing storm to hit, gods smiting gods, humans as collateral damage, only it doesn't happen because the son of a god was sacrificed, was risen and thus saved humanity. Ahem, I mean amen.
But it wasn't terrible, only disappointing hence 3 stars.
I really love Gaiman's style of discussing mythology and the more fantastic parts of our world. I love the way that Gaiman and Pratchett irreverantly talk about the apocalypse in Good Omens, and I loved the fantastic world of London Below in Neverwhere.
Gaiman tells a story about a man who gets caught up in something a little over his head. The book is completely filled with puns and references from all sorts of pop culture and mythos, and American Gods was simply a really fun read.
Truly amazing. I loved everything about this book. I loved the characters, the intrigue, the seamless weaving of the various religions/gods into one coherent, engrossing narrative. I liked this story much more than Neverwhere (which I also adored), but maybe not quite as much as Coraline. Although they are two WAY different genres that aren't meant to be compared. Gaiman grows on me more and more each time I read him.
