Tag Archives: Neil Gaiman

Endless Nights

Seven stories, one for each of Neil Gaiman’s Endless siblings. It wouldn’t seem like the best description to drum up interest in the newest (although not so very new) Sandman graphic novel, Endless Nights. At least, it wouldn’t to people who aren’t familiar with the series. If you are, seeing Neil Gaiman’s name attached to this property most likely comprises one of the few value guarantees out there. (I’ll try my damnedest not to gush further, when the next one of these comes up.)

Impressions: Desire’s story made me like it a little, which I’m not sure I ever had before. (Not that this lasted for very long.) Despair, although not an actual tale in the conventional sense, was gut-wrenchingly effective. Destiny is as uninteresting as he ever was, but I don’t think it’s his fault. Ten panels of Delight was enough to break my heart. Gaiman’s smart, to use her as sparingly as he has over all these years.

Finally, there are a couple of spoilers about the main sequence stories included here. That story is a lot more about the journey than the destination, but also these would probably be easier to appreciate by knowing the characters more thoroughly, anyhow.

Season of Mists

The Sandman, I said. And I meant it, because that is some damn fine literature. I read the series in 1996 or so, right after they’d all been published as graphic novels, and it was a hell of a ride. Observant visitors may notice the domain name, and wonder if it is a coincidence. (It is not. That’d be pretty funny if it were, though.)

What I didn’t ever do was own them. So, over the past few years I’ve been snagging them one at a time as the mood strikes me, and then reading them gradually at whim, not really part of a reading list schedule. The first few books are highly episodic in nature, with introductions to characters and the setting taking up a lot more space than ongoing storylines (although there’s no question that there are a couple of very solid ones). The upshot of this is that I haven’t felt compelled to review any of them yet. But over the past week, I read Season of Mists and it all fell into place. To the point where if I had income, I’d just buy the rest of them right now and take some time. But I do not, so enough about that!

I’m loathe to summarize it, in that I feel I can only damage the pristine beauty, but here goes: The Lord of Dreams attends a meeting with the other members of his Endless family at which he is goaded into righting a long-ago committed wrong, and in the process he receives a most unwelcome gift.

Having read the series before, I can also say that this is where most of the seeds are planted for remaining arc of the story, which could explain my hankering for the remaining volumes just now. The standard high quality of art rounds off the experience, which should be shared by everyone. (Incidentally: I’m caught up now. Yay!)