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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Absolute Sandman'
Written by Neil Gaiman Art by Sam Kieth, Mike Dringenberg, Malcolm Jones III, Chris Bachalo, Michael Zulli, Steve Parkhouse, Kelley Jones, Charles Vess and Colleen Doran Cover by Dave McKean THE SANDMAN, written by New York Times best-selling author Neil Gaiman, was the most acclaimed comic book title of the 1990s. A rich blend of modern myth and dark fantasy in which contemporary fiction, historical drama and legend are seamlessly interwoven, THE SANDMAN is also widely considered one of the most original and artistically ambitious series of the modern age. By the time it concluded in 1996, it had made significant contributions to the artistic maturity of comic books and become a pop culture phenomenon in its own right. Now, DC Comics is proud to present this comics classic in an all-new Absolute Edition format. The first of four beautifully designed slipcased volumes, THE ABSOLUTE SANDMAN VOL. 1 collects issues #1-20 of THE SANDMAN and features completely new coloring, approved by the author on the first 18 issues, as well as a host of never-before-seen extra material including the complete original Sandman proposal, a gallery of character designs from Gaiman and the artists who originated the look of the Sandman, and the original script for the World Fantasy Award-winning THE SANDMAN #19, "A Midsummer Night's Dream," together with reproductions of the issue's original pencils by Charles Vess. Also included are a new introduction by DC President & Publisher Paul Levitz and an afterword by Gaiman. - 612 pg, FC, $99.99 US - MATURE READERS [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'American Gods'
American Gods is Neil Gaiman's best and most ambitious novel yet, a scary, strange, and hallucinogenic road-trip story wrapped around a deep examination of the American spirit. Gaiman tackles everything from the onslaught of the information age to the meaning of death, but he doesn't sacrifice the razor-sharp plotting and narrative style he's been delivering since his Sandman days.
Shadow gets out of prison early when his wife is killed in a car crash. At a loss, he takes up with a mysterious character called Wednesday, who is much more than he appears. In fact, Wednesday is an old god, once known as Odin the All-father, who is roaming America rounding up his forgotten fellows in preparation for an epic battle against the upstart deities of the Internet, credit cards, television, and all that is wired. Shadow agrees to help Wednesday, and they whirl through a psycho-spiritual storm that becomes all too real in its manifestations. For instance, Shadow's dead wife Laura keeps showing up, and not just as a ghost--the difficulty of their continuing relationship is by turns grim and darkly funny, just like the rest of the book.
Armed only with some coin tricks and a sense of purpose, Shadow travels through, around, and underneath the visible surface of things, digging up all the powerful myths Americans brought with them in their journeys to this land as well as the ones that were already here. Shadow's road story is the heart of the novel, and it's here that Gaiman offers up the details that make this such a cinematic book--the distinctly American foods and diversions, the bizarre roadside attractions, the decrepit gods reduced to shell games and prostitution. "This is a bad land for Gods," says Shadow.
More than a tourist in America, but not a native, Neil Gaiman offers an outside-in and inside-out perspective on the soul and spirituality of the country--our obsessions with money and power, our jumbled religious heritage and its societal outcomes, and the millennial decisions we face about what's real and what's not. --Therese Littleton [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Anansi Boys: Library Edition'
One of fiction's most audaciously original talents, Neil Gaiman now gives us a mythology for a modern age -- complete with dark prophecy, family dysfunction, mystical deceptions, and killer birds. Not to mention a lime.
Anansi Boys
God is dead. Meet the kids.
When Fat Charlie's dad named something, it stuck. Like calling Fat Charlie "Fat Charlie." Even now, twenty years later, Charlie Nancy can't shake that name, one of the many embarrassing "gifts" his father bestowed -- before he dropped dead on a karaoke stage and ruined Fat Charlie's life.
Mr. Nancy left Fat Charlie things. Things like the tall, good-looking stranger who appears on Charlie's doorstep, who appears to be the brother he never knew. A brother as different from Charlie as night is from day, a brother who's going to show Charlie how to lighten up and have a little fun ... just like Dear Old Dad. And all of a sudden, life starts getting very interesting for Fat Charlie.
Because, you see, Charlie's dad wasn't just any dad. He was Anansi, a trickster god, the spider-god. Anansi is the spirit of rebellion, able to overturn the social order, create wealth out of thin air, and baffle the devil. Some said he could cheat even Death himself.
Returning to the territory he so brilliantly explored in his masterful New York Times bestseller, American Gods, the incomparable Neil Gaiman offers up a work of dazzling ingenuity, a kaleidoscopic journey deep into myth that is at once startling, terrifying, exhilarating, and fiercely funny -- a true wonder of a novel that confirms Stephen King's glowing assessment of the author as "a treasure-house of story, and we are lucky to have him."
[via]More editions of Anansi Boys: Library Edition:
› Find signed collectible books: 'The Books of Magic'
Written by Neil Gaiman; Art by John Bolton, Charles Vess, Paul Johnson, and Scott Hampton A quartet of fallen mystics dubbed the "TrenchCoat Brigade "is introduced in this first collection of the adventures of Timothy Hunter. John Constanine, the Phantom Stranger, Dr. Occult and Mister E take Hunter on a tour of the magical realms. Along the way he's introduced to Vertigo's greatest practitioners of magic and must choose whether or not to join their ranks. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Coraline'
Despite being mostly known for his fantastical graphic novels and adult fiction, Neil Gaiman's first book for children is everything that you would expect from such a massive imagination as his. It's special and wonderful and very weird indeed. Described by some as the new Alice in Wonderland, Coraline is actually more bizarre than that, much more frightening and its modest length definitely adds to the book's undiluted potency.
Shortly after moving into an old house with strange tenants above and below, Coraline discovers a big, carved, brown wooden door at the far corner of the drawing room. And it is locked. Curiosity runs riot in Coraline's mind and she unlocks the door to see what lies behind it. Disappointingly, it opens onto a brick wall. Days later, after exploring the rest of the house and garden, Coraline returns to the same mysterious door and opens it again. This time, however, there is a dark hallway in front of her. Stepping inside, the place beyond has an eerie familiarity about it. The carpet and wallpaper are the same as in her flat. The picture hanging on the wall is the same. Almost. Strangest of all, her mum and dad are there too. Only they have buttons for eyes and seem more possessive than normal. It's a twisted version of her world that is familiar, and yet sinister. And matters get even more surreal for Coraline when her "other" parents seem reluctant to let her leave.
Her attempted escape from this nightmare alternative reality sees Coraline experience a chilling series of ever more bizarre encounters. Some are plainly odd, others disturbingly spooky and together they combine to form an immensely readable story. It's like all the best bits of the Goosebumps books condensed into 160 pages. A unique reading experience guaranteed. (Ages 10 and over)--John McLay [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Day I Swapped My Dad for 2 Goldfish'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Death: The High Cost of Living'
Written by Neil Gaiman; Art by Chris Bachalo, Mark Buckingham, and others Death incarnate, as defined by master storyteller Neil Gaiman (THE SANDMAN), is a genuinely likeable young girl with a fondness for ankhs who truly cares about people. It's small wonder then that when a rising star of the music world wrestles with revealing her true sexual orientation just as her lover is lured into the realm of Death that Death herself should make an appearance. A practical, honest, and intelligent story that illuminates "the miracle of death." [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Death: The High Cost of Living'
Teenager Sexton Furnival is contemplating suicide when he is befriended by death. Death herself is being hunted by evil forces which prey on her new vulnerability now that she is human. Meanwhile, Mad Hettie threatens to kill Death's suicidal friend if Death won't help her find her heart. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Elementary Swordplay and Broadsword-Play'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Fragile Things: Short Fictions and Wonders'
A prodigiously imaginative collection.
New York Times Book Review, Editors Choice
Dazzling tales from a master of the fantastic.
Washington Post Book World
Fragile Things is a sterling collection of exceptional tales from Neil Gaiman, multiple award-winning (the Hugo, Bram Stoker, Newberry, and Eisner Awards, to name just a few), #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Graveyard Book, Anansi Boys, Coraline, and the groundbreaking Sandman graphic novel series. A uniquely imaginative creator of wonders whose unique storytelling genius has been acclaimed by a host of literary luminaries from Norman Mailer to Stephen King, Gaimans astonishing powers are on glorious displays in Fragile Things. Enter and be amazed!
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› Find signed collectible books: 'A Game of You'
You may have heard somewhere that Neil Gaiman's Sandman series consisted of cool, hip, edgy, smart comic books. And you may have thought, "What the hell does that mean?" Enter A Game of You to confound the issue even more, while at the same time standing as a fine example of such a description. This is not an easy book. The characters are dense and unique, while their observations are, as always with Gaiman, refreshingly familiar. Then there's the plot, which grinds along like a coffee mill, in the process breaking down the two worlds of this series, that of the dream and that of the dreamer. Gaiman pushes these worlds to their very extremes--one is a fantasy world with talking animals, a missing princess, and a mysterious villain called the Cuckoo; the other is an urban microcosm inhabited by a drag queen, a punk lesbian couple, and a New York doll named Barbie. In almost every way this book sits at 180 degrees from the earlier four volumes of the Sandman series--although the less it seems to belong to the series, the more it shows its heart. --Jim Pascoe [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Good Omens'
The world is going to end next Saturday, just before dinner, but it turns out there are a few problems--the Antichrist has been misplaced, the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse ride motorcycles, and the representatives from heaven and hell decide that they like the human race. Reprint. NYT. AB. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Good Omens'
Pratchett (of Discworld fame) and Gaiman (of Sandman fame) may seem an unlikely combination, but the topic (Armageddon) of this fast-paced novel is old hat to both. Pratchett's wackiness collaborates with Gaiman's morbid humor; the result is a humanist delight to be savored and reread again and again. You see, there was a bit of a mixup when the Antichrist was born, due in part to the machinations of Crowley, who did not so much fall as saunter downwards, and in part to the mysterious ways as manifested in the form of a part-time rare book dealer, an angel named Aziraphale. Like top agents everywhere, they've long had more in common with each other than the sides they represent, or the conflict they are nominally engaged in. The only person who knows how it will all end is Agnes Nutter, a witch whose prophecies all come true, if one can only manage to decipher them. The minor characters along the way (Famine makes an appearance as diet crazes, no-calorie food and anorexia epidemics) are as much fun as the story as a whole, which adds up to one of those rare books which is enormous fun to read the first time, and the second time, and the third time... [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch'
Pratchett (of Discworld fame) and Gaiman (of Sandman fame) may seem an unlikely combination, but the topic (Armageddon) of this fast-paced novel is old hat to both. Pratchett's wackiness collaborates with Gaiman's morbid humor; the result is a humanist delight to be savored and reread again and again. You see, there was a bit of a mixup when the Antichrist was born, due in part to the machinations of Crowley, who did not so much fall as saunter downwards, and in part to the mysterious ways as manifested in the form of a part-time rare book dealer, an angel named Aziraphale. Like top agents everywhere, they've long had more in common with each other than the sides they represent, or the conflict they are nominally engaged in. The only person who knows how it will all end is Agnes Nutter, a witch whose prophecies all come true, if one can only manage to decipher them. The minor characters along the way (Famine makes an appearance as diet crazes, no-calorie food and anorexia epidemics) are as much fun as the story as a whole, which adds up to one of those rare books which is enormous fun to read the first time, and the second time, and the third time... [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess's Stardust'
The versatile Neil Gaiman is best known for scripting upmarket graphic novels, most famously the lengthy Sandman cycle. Stardust was a joint project with artist Charles Vess, a short novel of fairyland enriched by at least one sumptuous painting on every page. This edition contains only the (slightly rewritten) text, alas. Gaiman's story looks back to days before commercial genre fantasy, to Lord Dunsany's and Hope Mirrlees's visions of Faerie as a misty country which is at the same time temptingly close and "over the hills and far away". The simple tale is new but has a twice-told familiarity, crafted like a mosaic from many traditional elements. Hopelessly crossed in love, a boy of half-fairy parentage leaves his mundane Victorian-English village on a quest for a fallen star in the magical realm. The star proves to be an attractive woman with a hot temper, who plunges with our hero into adventures featuring witches, the lion and the unicorn, plotting elf-lords, ships that sail the sky, magical transformations, curses whose effects rebound, binding conditions with hidden loopholes and all the rest. Stardust is by turns knowing, poetic, comic and grisly and exudes considerable charm. If only we had those full-colour Vess paintings too. --David Langford [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Neverwhere'
Neverwhere's protagonist, Richard Mayhew, learns the hard way that no good deed goes unpunished. He ceases to exist in the ordinary world of London Above, and joins a quest through the dark and dangerous London Below, a shadow city of lost and forgotten people, places, and times. His companions are Door, who is trying to find out who hired the assassins who murdered her family and why; the Marquis of Carabas, a trickster who trades services for very big favors; and Hunter, a mysterious lady who guards bodies and hunts only the biggest game. London Below is a wonderfully realized shadow world, and the story plunges through it like an express passing local stations, with plenty of action and a satisfying conclusion. The story is reminiscent of Douglas Adams's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but Neil Gaiman's humor is much darker and his images sometimes truly horrific. Puns and allusions to everything from Paradise Lost to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz abound, but you can enjoy the book without getting all of them. Gaiman is definitely not just for graphic-novel fans anymore. --Nona Vero [via]
› Find signed collectible books: 'Sandman 3: Dream Country'
The third book of the Sandman collection is a series of four short comic book stories. What's remarkable here (considering the publisher and the time that this was originally published) is that the main character of the book--the Sandman, King of Dreams--serves only as a minor character in each of these otherwise unrelated stories. (Actually, he's not even in the last story.) This signaled a couple of important things in the development of what is considered one of the great comics of the second half of the century. First, it marked a distinct move away from the horror genre and into a more fantasy-rich, classical mythology-laden environment. And secondly, it solidly cemented Neil Gaiman as a storyteller. One of the stories here, "A Midsummer Night's Dream," took home the World Fantasy Award for best short story--the first time a comic was given that honor. But for my money, another story in Dream Country has it beat hands down. "A Dream of a Thousand Cats" has such hope, beauty, and good old-fashioned chills that rereading it becomes a welcome pleasure. --Jim Pascoe [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Sandman 4: Season of Mists'
In many ways, Season of Mists is the pinnacle of the Sandman experience. After a brief intermission of four short stories (collected as Dream Country) Gaiman continued the story of the Dream King that he began in the first two volumes. Here in volume 4, we find out about the rest of Dream's Endless family (Desire, Despair, Destiny, Delirium, Death, and a seventh missing sibling). We find out the story behind Nada, Dream's first love, whom we met only in passing during Dream's visit to hell in the first book. When Dream goes back to hell to resolve unfinished business with Nada, he finds her missing along with all of the other dead souls. The answer to this mystery lies in Lucifer's most uncharacteristic decision--a delicious surprise.
There is something grandiose about this story, in which each chapter ends with such suspense and drive to read the next. This book is best summed up by a toast taken from the second chapter: "To absent friends, lost loves, old gods, and the season of mists; and may each and every one of us always give the devil his due." --Jim Pascoe [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Sandman 5: A Game of You'
You may have heard somewhere that Neil Gaiman's Sandman series consisted of cool, hip, edgy, smart comic books. And you may have thought, "What the hell does that mean?" Enter A Game of You to confound the issue even more, while at the same time standing as a fine example of such a description. This is not an easy book. The characters are dense and unique, while their observations are, as always with Gaiman, refreshingly familiar. Then there's the plot, which grinds along like a coffee mill, in the process breaking down the two worlds of this series, that of the dream and that of the dreamer. Gaiman pushes these worlds to their very extremes--one is a fantasy world with talking animals, a missing princess, and a mysterious villain called the Cuckoo; the other is an urban microcosm inhabited by a drag queen, a punk lesbian couple, and a New York doll named Barbie. In almost every way this book sits at 180 degrees from the earlier four volumes of the Sandman series--although the less it seems to belong to the series, the more it shows its heart. --Jim Pascoe [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Sandman 8: World's End'
When Brant and Charlene wreck their car in a horrible snowstorm in the middle of nowhere, the only place they can find shelter is a mysterious little inn called World's End. Here they wait out the storm and listen to stories from the many travelers also stuck at this tavern. These tales exemplify Neil Gaiman's gift for storytelling--and his love for the very telling of them. This volume has almost nothing to do with the larger story of the Sandman, except for a brief foreshadowing nod. It's a nice companion to the best Sandman short story collection, Dream Country, (and it's much better than the hodgepodge Fables and Reflections). World's End works best as a collection--it's a story about a story about stories--all wrapped up in a structure that's clever without being cute, and which features an ending nothing short of spectacular. --Jim Pascoe [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Sandman : Book of Dreams'
A collection of short works includes stories that range in setting from a battlefield to a deathbed, from a ghost-ridden cellar to a hotel convention of serial killers, and includes works by Stephen King, Clive Barker, Tad Williams, and other notable writers. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Sandman Companion'
The Sandman was a groundbreaking and award-winning series that told the dark and tragic tale of Morpheus, the King of Dreams. A fascinating mythology of horror and consequence, this epic masterfully combined intriguing literature with captivating art. THE SANDMAN COMPANION is an exhaustive guide to this legend. Revealing hitherto undisclosed information and behind-the-scenes secrets, this book features in-depth interviews, never-before-seen illustrations, character origins, and story explanations and analysis. Also including excerpts from the original proposal for the series, this handbook is the perfect complement to the Sandman graphic novels. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Sandman Companion'
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Sandman : Dream Country'
The third book of the Sandman collection is a series of four short comic book stories. What's remarkable here (considering the publisher and the time that this was originally published) is that the main character of the book--the Sandman, King of Dreams--serves only as a minor character in each of these otherwise unrelated stories. (Actually, he's not even in the last story.) This signaled a couple of important things in the development of what is considered one of the great comics of the second half of the century. First, it marked a distinct move away from the horror genre and into a more fantasy-rich, classical mythology-laden environment. And secondly, it solidly cemented Neil Gaiman as a storyteller. One of the stories here, "A Midsummer Night's Dream," took home the World Fantasy Award for best short story--the first time a comic was given that honor. But for my money, another story in Dream Country has it beat hands down. "A Dream of a Thousand Cats" has such hope, beauty, and good old-fashioned chills that rereading it becomes a welcome pleasure. --Jim Pascoe [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Sandman Library'
In many ways, Season of Mists is the pinnacle of the Sandman experience. After a brief intermission of four short stories (collected as Dream Country) Gaiman continued the story of the Dream King that he began in the first two volumes. Here in volume 4, we find out about the rest of Dream's Endless family (Desire, Despair, Destiny, Delirium, Death, and a seventh missing sibling). We find out the story behind Nada, Dream's first love, whom we met only in passing during Dream's visit to hell in the first book. When Dream goes back to hell to resolve unfinished business with Nada, he finds her missing along with all of the other dead souls. The answer to this mystery lies in Lucifer's most uncharacteristic decision--a delicious surprise.
There is something grandiose about this story, in which each chapter ends with such suspense and drive to read the next. This book is best summed up by a toast taken from the second chapter: "To absent friends, lost loves, old gods, and the season of mists; and may each and every one of us always give the devil his due." --Jim Pascoe [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Sandman: The Wake'
With The Sandman: Endless Nights, bestselling author Neil Gaiman returns to the characters (and medium) that made him famous. It's a collection of seven short stories, each illustrated by some of the best artists working in contemporary comics (eg, Frank Quitely, Glenn Fabry and Milo Manara) and focusing on the Endless--the anthropomorphic manifestations of seven universal concepts: Death, Desire, Dream, Despair, Delirium, Destruction and Destiny. So, it's a collection of fantasy stories, but don't let that put you off. Gaiman is much more than a typical fantasy storyteller--his strength has always been his ability to ground his epic concepts within a sympathetically human framework. That's one of the reasons why the original Sandman series was so successful--nowadays, thanks to the work of creators like Neil Gaiman (and, of course, Alan Moore), it's difficult to remember a time when comics (or graphic novels, or sequential storytelling, or whatever people want to call them nowadays) weren't taken very seriously as a "grown-up" medium.
That said, Endless Nights is a bit hit and miss. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the best story here is Dream ("The Heart of a Star"), where Gaiman and artist Miguelanxo Prado revisit the Sandman's protagonist and tell a short, poignant love story from the character's past, carefully constructed to please fans without baffling newcomers. "15 Portraits of Despair", with Barron Storey's art and Dave McKean's designs, is not a story but a collection of darkly-toned, disturbing vignettes, while Bill Sienkiewicz's art for Delirium ("Going Inside") is appropriately manic and unhinged. But, unfortunately, some of the stories here lack any real depth: Frank Quitely's art for Destiny ("Endless Nights") adds a grandiose scale to a story that is little more than a character sketch (albeit a beautiful one), while the Destruction story ("On the Peninsula") squanders what could have been an interesting idea if Gaiman had had more time and space to flesh it out. Still, Endless Nights should be enough to keep Sandman fans happy, while acting as a useful introduction to these characters for any newcomers. And if it gets more people reading Sandman, that can only be a good thing. --Robert Burrow [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Smoke and Mirrors'
This anthology of short stories, and the occasional story poem, is vintage Neil Gaiman: quirky, sometimes very funny, often dark and disturbing. Most have been published before, but are hard to find elsewhere and cover all of Gaiman's writing life. As Gaiman says in his introduction, "most of the stories in this book are about love in some form or another," but not requited love. The stories in Smoke and Mirrors touch on all of Gaiman's themes: sex, death, dreams, and the end of the world. From "Chivalry," about the Holy Grail and where it finally ended up, to "Troll Bridge," a very adult version of "The Three Billy Goats Gruff"; from "Bay Wolf," a story poem that melds Beowulf and Baywatch, with interesting results, to "Murder Mysteries," which is about a murder, but also about angels, God's will, and Evil, these stories leave lasting impressions. Fans of Ray Bradbury's short stories and of Gaiman's other works will enjoy this collection. --Nona Vero [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Smoke and Mirrors: Short Fictions and Illustrations'
More editions of Smoke and Mirrors: Short Fictions and Illustrations:
› Find signed collectible books: 'Smoke And Mirrors: Short Fictions And Illusions'
This anthology of short stories, and the occasional story poem, is vintage Neil Gaiman: quirky, sometimes very funny, often dark and disturbing. Most have been published before, but are hard to find elsewhere and cover all of Gaiman's writing life. As Gaiman says in his introduction, "most of the stories in this book are about love in some form or another," but not requited love. The stories in Smoke and Mirrors touch on all of Gaiman's themes: sex, death, dreams, and the end of the world. From "Chivalry," about the Holy Grail and where it finally ended up, to "Troll Bridge," a very adult version of "The Three Billy Goats Gruff"; from "Bay Wolf," a story poem that melds Beowulf and Baywatch, with interesting results, to "Murder Mysteries," which is about a murder, but also about angels, God's will, and Evil, these stories leave lasting impressions. Fans of Ray Bradbury's short stories and of Gaiman's other works will enjoy this collection. --Nona Vero [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Stardust'
The versatile Neil Gaiman is best known for scripting upmarket graphic novels, most famously the lengthy Sandman cycle. Stardust was a joint project with artist Charles Vess, a short novel of fairyland enriched by at least one sumptuous painting on every page. This edition contains only the (slightly rewritten) text, alas. Gaiman's story looks back to days before commercial genre fantasy, to Lord Dunsany's and Hope Mirrlees's visions of Faerie as a misty country which is at the same time temptingly close and "over the hills and far away". The simple tale is new but has a twice-told familiarity, crafted like a mosaic from many traditional elements. Hopelessly crossed in love, a boy of half-fairy parentage leaves his mundane Victorian-English village on a quest for a fallen star in the magical realm. The star proves to be an attractive woman with a hot temper, who plunges with our hero into adventures featuring witches, the lion and the unicorn, plotting elf-lords, ships that sail the sky, magical transformations, curses whose effects rebound, binding conditions with hidden loopholes and all the rest. Stardust is by turns knowing, poetic, comic and grisly and exudes considerable charm. If only we had those full-colour Vess paintings too. --David Langford [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Wake Bk. X'
This is the conclusion to the much talked about Sandman series. It may be best to start your Sandman acquaintance with earlier episodes, but The Wake stands as one of Neil Gaiman's strongest and most consistent Sandman volumes to date. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'The Wolves In The Walls'
Truth be told, Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean's picture book The Wolves in the Walls is terrifying. Sure, the story is fairytale-like and presented in a jaunty, casually nonsensical way, but it is absolutely the stuff of nightmares. Lucy hears wolves hustling, bustling, crinkling and crackling in the walls of the old house where her family lives, but no one believes her. Her mother says it's mice, her brother says bats, and her father says what everyone seems to say: "If the wolves come out of the walls, it's all over." Lucy remains convinced, as is her beloved pig-puppet, and her worst fears are confirmed when the wolves actually do come out of the walls.
Up to this point, McKean's illustrations are spectacular, sinister collages awash in golden sepia tones evocative of the creepy beauty in The City of Lost Children. The wolves explode into the story in scratchy pen-and-ink, all jaws and eyes. The family flees to the cold, moonlit garden, where they ponder their future. Her brother suggests they escape to outer space where there's "nothing but foozles and squossucks for billions of miles". Lucy wants to live in her own house...and she wants the pig-puppet she left behind.
Eventually she talks her family into moving back into the once-wolfish walls, where they peek out at the wolves who are watching their television and spilling popcorn on slices of toast and jam, dashing up the stairs and wearing their clothes. When the family can't stand it anymore, they burst forth from the walls, scaring the wolves, who shout "And when the people come out of the walls, it's all over!" The wolves flee and everything goes back to normal...until the tidy ending when Lucy hears "a noise that sounded exactly like an elephant trying not to sneeze". Adult fans of this talented pair will revel in the quirky story and its darkly gorgeous, deliciously shadowy trappings, but the young or faint of heart, beware. The book is recommended for ages nine and above. --Karin Snelson, Amazon.com [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'World's End'
When Brant and Charlene wreck their car in a horrible snowstorm in the middle of nowhere, the only place they can find shelter is a mysterious little inn called World's End. Here they wait out the storm and listen to stories from the many travelers also stuck at this tavern. These tales exemplify Neil Gaiman's gift for storytelling--and his love for the very telling of them. This volume has almost nothing to do with the larger story of the Sandman, except for a brief foreshadowing nod. It's a nice companion to the best Sandman short story collection, Dream Country, (and it's much better than the hodgepodge Fables and Reflections). World's End works best as a collection--it's a story about a story about stories--all wrapped up in a structure that's clever without being cute, and which features an ending nothing short of spectacular. --Jim Pascoe [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Buenos Presagios: Las Buenas Y Ajustadas Profecfas De Agnes La Chalada/Good Omens The Nice & Accurate Prophecies Of Agnes Nutter, Witch'
Nota: En los titulos y nombres de autores, los marcos ortograficos han sido omitidos para facilitar las busquedas de Internet. Las Buenas y Ajustadas Profecias de Agnes la Chalada anuncian que el mundo se acabara un sabado. El proximo sabado, de hecho. Justo despues de la hora del te. . .
English: According to the Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter--the world's only totally reliable guide to the future--the world will end on a Saturday. Next Saturday, in fact. Just after tea... From two delightful imaginations comes an unforgettable story in which the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse ride motorcycles, the hound of the devil chases sticks, and the end of the world is subject to Murphy's Law... From Amazon.com. . . Pratchett (of Discworld fame) and Gaiman (of Sandman fame) may seem an unlikely combination, but the topic (Armageddon) of this fast-paced novel is old hat to both. Pratchett's wackiness collaborates with Gaiman's morbid humor; the result is a humanist delight to be savored and reread again and again. You see, there was a bit of a mixup when the Antichrist was born, due in part to the machinations of Crowley, who did not so much fall as saunter downwards, and in part to the mysterious ways as manifested in the form of a part-time rare book dealer, an angel named Aziraphale. Like top agents everywhere, they've long had more in common with each other than the sides they represent, or the conflict they are nominally engaged in. The only person who knows how it will all end is Agnes Nutter, a witch whose prophecies all come true, if one can only manage to decipher them. The minor characters along the way (Famine makes an appearance as diet crazes, no-calorie food and anorexia epidemics) are as much fun as the story as a whole, which adds up to one of those rare books which is enormous fun to read the first time, and the second time, and the third time... [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'El Dia Que Cambie A Mi Padre Por Dos Peces De Colores'
DESCRIPTION: Nota: En los titulos y nombres de autores, los marcos ortograficos han sido omitidos para facilitar las busquedas de Internet. Description del libro en espanol: El padre del protagonista y narrador no hace otra cosa que leer el periodico. Cuando su amigo Natan le trae dos peces de colores se los acaba cambiando por su padre. Cuando la madre llega y ve lo que han hecho sus hijos les dice que vayan y vuelvan a cambiar a su padre por los peces. Pero Natan lo habia ya cambiado a otro amigo por una guitarra, y ese otro por una mascara de gorila, y el siguiente por un conejo... Una entranable fabula infantil acerca de un nino que cambia a su padre por dos peces y luego se arrepiente y va en su busca. Los dibujos de Dave McKean son una delicia.
Book Description in English: One day Nathan comes over with two goldfish named Sawney and Beaney. "I'll swap you them," says the little boy of the house. "What for" asks Nathan. As it turns out, Nathan doesn't want anything that the boy and his little sister suggest for trading... not an old spaceship or even Clownie the clown. Finally, the boy has an idea, the kind of idea (like discovering "electricity or fire or outer space or something") that changes the whole world. He decides to swap his dad (the silent guy behind the newspaper) for two goldfish. After all, the boy brags, his dad is as big as 100 goldfish and he swims better than a goldfish ("Liar," says his little sister.) But Nathan agrees to take their dad anyway. When their mother gets home, she is very mad, and sends her kids over to Nathan's to get their dad back. Sadly, Nathan has already traded their dad for an electric guitar. Page upon hilarious page goes by, as the father is traded again and again. When they! finally track him down, he is still reading the newspaper! (Mom makes them promise never to swap their dad for anything ever again, and they promise.) Comic masters Neil Gaiman and artist Dave McKean have created a wonderful graphic short story for all ages. The artwork is magnificent, funny, multi-textured, and scritchy--the perfect visual accompaniment to this hip, kid-friendly exploration of the perils of bartering family members. [via]
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› Find signed collectible books: 'Stardust'
De Féerie, le pays magique, les habitants du petit village de Wall savent peu de choses. Il faut dire qu'un grand mur les en séparent. Un mur dans lequel est ouvert une brèche, une brèche bien gardée, par laquelle ils n'ont droit de passer qu'une fois l'an, le jour de la grande foire de Wall. C'est ce jour-là, justement, que le jeune Tristram Thorn, décidé à conquérir le cSur de sa belle, part pour le pays de fée afin de lui ramener une étoile filante. Mais dans un pays magique, rien n'est comme ailleurs. Les distances sont immenses, on y croise nains et licornes, des chasseurs d'éclairs naviguent sur des bateaux volants et l'on est jamais à l'abri d'un mauvais sort qui pourra vous transformer en arbre, en chèvre ou en rat. Un monde plein de dangers et de merveilles que Tristram est loin d'imaginer, comme il est loin d'imaginer que son étoile filante est une belle et pure jeune fille, dont la présence ici-bas va éveiller la concupiscence des sept seigneurs de Sromhold comme de quelques vilaines sorcières...
Neil Gaiman est aussi à l'aise dans la BD (Sandman), que dans le roman (Neverwhere). Un talent inépuisable qu'il confirme une fois de plus ici en revisitant avec bonheur l'univers des contes de fées. À la fois drôle, merveilleux et volontairement naïf, Stardust est une réussite. --Georges Louhans [via]
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