American Gods
These are my notes about the book “American Gods” by Neil Gaiman.
A novel is always … a long piece of prose with something wrong with it.
—Neil Gaiman
In the book American Gods (2001) by Neil Gaiman, the gods are still with us, but they are ignored and forgotten, and they’re tired of that. They begin to make a last reappearance in America.
Shadow, released from prison, is visited by a god, a buffalo man, in a dream while on an airplane flight to his home city. On the second leg of his flight, he ends up sitting next to another god named Mister Wednesday, who knows way too much about him and who offers him a job.
Shadow ends up accepting the job offer after he discovers that his original plan for a job had disappeared because his wife and best friend died in a car crash. I am omitting many entertaining details in this quick summary.
Working for Mister Wednesday, Shadow travels around the United States, repeatedly encountering the gods, who are warring with one another, the younger gods trying to overcome the older gods. Shadow solves a deep mystery, gains powers, and grows and matures as a human being. The book is a satisfying read.
The writing is very good. Neil Gaiman, in the Tenth Anniversary Edition containing the author’s preferred text, writes about the revisions he made to the book. The revisions make the story flow quickly and effortlessly.
I bought this book at Hub Comics here in Somerville, Massachusetts, more than ten years ago, and it took me three or four years until I found time to read it. I am writing these quick notes now because I’m decluttering the house and about to put the book in a Little Free Library for someone else to find and read.
Rating: Four of five stars (very good)