The Lousypoet

Fragile Things
by Neil Gaiman

Fragile things is yet another compilation of Neil Gaiman’s short stories and poetry. Most of these stories have seen life in other publications, but I suppose if you don’t subscribe to every short story magazine, nor buy every short story anthology, chances are you haven’t seen many, if any, of these stories before.

Once again, reading these, it just comes back that Gaiman is our own modern myth maker. When Gaiman does a full length novel, you can feel the myth and magic simmering along, but it is so clear in these short fables that I had to digest them over far more time than it usually takes me to devour a full length novel. There’s just so many cool ideas, nuanced themes, and sometimes, maddening twists, that I found I could only manage a story or two per sitting. This is in contrast to finishing one of his 500 page novels within a night or two.

Fans of American Gods will be particularly happy to find a new novella based on Shadow’s life two years after the events of American Gods. I really enjoyed it, and being hooked along made me realise just how thirsty I had been for more of Shadow’s adventures. I was almost sad to see it come to an end. It was also interesting to read this having seen Gaiman’s theatrical take on the whole Grendel affair.

There’s also some other things here that are a bit more avante garde, but truly build an appreciation for Gaiman. His writings for Scarlet’s Walk, the Tori Amos album, are really cool. While individually there are snippets of travel and obsession, they add up to something far greater, almost reminding me of the movie Momento when it was all said and done.

All in all, this one was very satisfying. Each story was unique, proving just how seemingly boundless Neil Gaiman’s imagination can be.