NEIL GAIMAN - "You get what everybody gets - you get a lifetime."

Neil Gaiman

I have many favorite writers. Ray Bradbury, Kurt Vonnegut, Warren Ellis, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Brian K. Vaughn, and several others (usually depending on which of them I've read most recently). Among them is Neil Gaiman. Writer of comics, short stories, novels, television, and film, Gaiman has written things I've loved, and things I haven't read yet, and am sure I will someday love.

In honor of the upcoming The Ocean at the End of the Lane, I wanted to talk about my love of Gaiman's writing. I first discovered Neil Gaiman (years after others already had) with The Sandman, his highly-acclaimed comic series from Vertigo. At the time, I hadn't read very many comics that weren't about superheroes, so Sandman was my introduction to the idea that comics could be about anything. ANYTHING. It's impossible for me to overstate the influence this would have on me.

The Sandman also shifted my focus from artists to writers, and I began seeking out any work by Gaiman I could find. I quickly discovered that he had written a novel with another favorite author of mine, Terry Pratchett (the Discworld series). Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch is a funny story about an angel and a demon who attempt to avert the final battle between Heaven and Hell, primarily because they like things just fine the way they are. It's darkly humorous and irreverent, and like the best stories contains a number of insightful truths about our own world.

Up next, for me, was Neverwhere. Written as an adaptation of Gaiman's teleplay, the novel tells the story of a man who discovers a secret London located both beneath and within the London he knows. At this point the only fantasy I'd read had been Tolkien-inspired books set in quasi-medieval settings featuring heroes battling evil forces for the fate of the world. Neverwhere, in contrast, is urban fantasy, where the magical elements aren't nearly as far away as one would like to think. 

American Gods merges, in some ways, elements of both Sandman and Neverwhere, bringing into conflict the gods of the old world and the gods of the new. As the protagonist, Shadow, travels across America, Gaiman casts an outsider's eye on this relatively young country. As he so often does, Gaiman allows us to see the familiar in a very unfamiliar way.

Gaiman's The Graveyard Book recasts an old classic (Kipling's The Jungle Book) with a gothic sensibility, transplanting the basic story to a cemetery populated with both the dead and undead. These creatures raise a young orphan, and hide and keep him safe from those that are trying to harm him.

Where Gaiman excels in all of his work is seemingly effortlessly blending genres and styles. Horror, fantasy, humor, slice of life, history - he defies strict categorization, and like many of the writers I love and am influenced by, simply tells interesting stories in interesting ways.