American Gods by Neil Gaiman
Fantasy , Headline , Neil Gaiman / May 1, 2017

A storm is coming… Locked behind bars for three years, Shadow did his time, quietly waiting for the magic day when he could return to Eagle Point, Indiana. A man no longer scared of what tomorrow might bring, all he wanted was to be with Laura, the wife he deeply loved, and start a new life. But just days before his release, Laura and Shadow’s best friend are killed in an accident. With his life in pieces and nothing to keep him tethered, Shadow accepts a job from a beguiling stranger he meets on the way home, an enigmatic man who calls himself Mr. Wednesday. A trickster and rogue, Wednesday seems to know more about Shadow than Shadow does himself. Life as Wednesday’s bodyguard, driver, and errand boy /is far more interesting and dangerous than Shadow ever imagined—it is a job that takes him on a dark and strange road trip and introduces him to a host of eccentric characters whose fates are mysteriously intertwined with his own. Along the way Shadow will learn that the past never dies; that everyone, including his beloved Laura, harbors secrets; and that dreams, totems, legends, and myths are more real than we know….

Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
Fantasy , Headline , Neil Gaiman / July 14, 2016

A special illustrated edition of the stunningly original and brilliant first novel from a storytelling genius. Under the streets of London there’s a world most people could never even dream of. A city of monsters and saints, murderers and angels, and pale girls in black velvet. Richard Mayhew is a young businessman who is about to find out more than he bargained for about this other London. A single act of kindness catapults him out of his safe and predictable life and into a world that is at once eerily familiar and yet utterly bizarre. There’s a girl named Door, an Angel called Islington, an Earl who holds Court on the carriage of a Tube train, a Beast in a labyrinth, and dangers and delights beyond imagining… And Richard, who only wants to go home, is to find a strange destiny waiting for him below the streets of his native city. I’ve always considered Neverwhere to be the granddaddy of modern urban fantasy. Thinking about all the excellent books I’ve read since I started The Eloquent Page, I’m sure there are many who owe their genesis to Gaiman’s masterwork. Books like The City’s Son by Tom Pollock, Sixty One Nails by…

Good Omens by Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Corgi , Fantasy , Neil Gaiman , Terry Pratchett / May 27, 2011

You may have heard that the world was supposed to end last weekend. Based on the fact that you are reading this post, I think we can all safely assume that it didn’t. It struck me that predictions can be, at best, awfully fickle things. If only there was a book that didn’t mess about, something that took all the guess work out of things and just made The Apocalypse simple. 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… Good Omens was originally published way back in the halcyon days of nineteen ninety. At the time, I was a thoroughly impressionable sixteen year old and I think, in hindsight, that I can now squarely point the finger of blame for my obsession with the end of the world on this novel. The premise is simple, the Antichrist is born on Earth and following a baby switch that quickly devolves into farce, he ends up with a family in a sleepy little village in England rather than as the son of a US…