Hardcover, 465 pages
English language
Published March 26, 2001 by William Morrow.
The storm was coming....
Shadow spent three years in prison, keeping his head down, doing his time. All he wanted was to get back to the loving arms of his wife and to stay out of trouble for the rest of his life. But days before his scheduled release, he learns that his wife has been killed in an accident, and his world becomes a colder place.
On the plane ride home to the funeral, Shadow meets a grizzled man who calls himself Mr. Wednesday. A self-styled grifter and rogue, Wednesday offers Shadow a job. And Shadow, a man with nothing to lose, accepts.
But working for the enigmatic Wednesday is not without its price, and Shadow soon learns that his role in Wednesday's schemes will be far more dangerous than he ever could have imagined. Entangled in a world of secrets, he embarks on a wild road trip and …
The storm was coming....
Shadow spent three years in prison, keeping his head down, doing his time. All he wanted was to get back to the loving arms of his wife and to stay out of trouble for the rest of his life. But days before his scheduled release, he learns that his wife has been killed in an accident, and his world becomes a colder place.
On the plane ride home to the funeral, Shadow meets a grizzled man who calls himself Mr. Wednesday. A self-styled grifter and rogue, Wednesday offers Shadow a job. And Shadow, a man with nothing to lose, accepts.
But working for the enigmatic Wednesday is not without its price, and Shadow soon learns that his role in Wednesday's schemes will be far more dangerous than he ever could have imagined. Entangled in a world of secrets, he embarks on a wild road trip and encounters, among others, the murderous Czernobog, the impish Mr. Nancy, and the beautiful Easter -- all of whom seem to know more about Shadow than he himself does.
Shadow will learn that the past does not die, that everyone, including his late wife, had secrets, and that the stakes are higher than anyone could have imagined.
All around them a storm of epic proportions threatens to break. Soon Shadow and Wednesday will be swept up into a conflict as old as humanity itself. For beneath the placid surface of everyday life a war is being fought -- and the prize is the very soul of America.
As unsettling as it is exhilarating, American Gods is a dark and kaleidoscopic journey deep into myth and across an America at once eerily familiar and utterly alien. Magnificently told, this work of literary magic will haunt the reader far beyond the final page. --front flap
I read the 10th anniversary edition, which is longer than the original. It seemed a little slow at times and I think the original edition might be better.
Hugely entertaining book, full of weirdness and references - not only the gods themselves but I could see enough subtle little literary allusions to realise there must be many more there. Also some that I suspect may just be looking too hard, but oh well - they didn't detract anything from the book....
I love the broad ambition of this story, the multiple levels it runs on, and the ease with which Gaiman can switch between those levels. It suffers a little from trying to pack too much in. By the end I was a bit tired of new characters being introduced without development, and wishing a few of the subplots had been explored better. It's both telling and a good move that when Gaiman wrote a ~sequel (Anansi Boys) he picked up one of the second-tier characters from American Gods, fleshed him out beautifully, and told a much more …
Hugely entertaining book, full of weirdness and references - not only the gods themselves but I could see enough subtle little literary allusions to realise there must be many more there. Also some that I suspect may just be looking too hard, but oh well - they didn't detract anything from the book....
I love the broad ambition of this story, the multiple levels it runs on, and the ease with which Gaiman can switch between those levels. It suffers a little from trying to pack too much in. By the end I was a bit tired of new characters being introduced without development, and wishing a few of the subplots had been explored better. It's both telling and a good move that when Gaiman wrote a ~sequel (Anansi Boys) he picked up one of the second-tier characters from American Gods, fleshed him out beautifully, and told a much more focussed story with him. Anansi Boys ends up being a stronger book as a result.
A few references I'm wondering about:
About halfway through part one, there seemed to be a subtle allusion to Eliot's Journey Of The Magi. I'm not sure if it's either intended or real, but read or listen to the poem: www.poetryarchive.org/poem/journey-magi - it seems to fit, eh?
One thing I was left not understanding at the end was why Wednesday needed Shadow. It seemed that he could have orchestrated the whole con at less risk without Shadow involved, which was the one thing I found unsatisfying about the otherwise very clever ending. I read somewhere that Monarch Of The Glen explains more about who Shadow is, so I'm looking forward to reading that.
The two-man con idea feels like a wonderfully biting allegory about US politics. If so, then Gaiman was pretty prescient - it's a thing that has become much more obvious since.
The two-man con and its motivations also feels like an allegory about the "Clash of Civilizations" nonsense that has potential to be so self-fulfilling. I'm pretty sure this on my mind because I happen to have read the book in a week when anti-Muslim attacks in the US are more prominent in the news than usual, but I wonder if it wasn't also an intended message, given that the book was first published in 2001. But then... that crap didn't get much airtime until 9/11, and this book must have mostly been written before that.
And finally, I really want to learn more about Sammy Black Crow. I was expecting her to be more significant in the end.
Hugely entertaining book, full of weirdness and references - not only the gods themselves but I could see enough subtle little literary allusions to realise there must be many more there. Also some that I suspect may just be looking too hard, but oh well - they didn't detract anything from the book....
I love the broad ambition of this story, the multiple levels it runs on, and the ease with which Gaiman can switch between those levels. It suffers a little from trying to pack too much in. By the end I was a bit tired of new characters being introduced without development, and wishing a few of the subplots had been explored better. It's both telling and a good move that when Gaiman wrote a ~sequel (Anansi Boys) he picked up one of the second-tier characters from American Gods, fleshed him out beautifully, and told a much more …
Hugely entertaining book, full of weirdness and references - not only the gods themselves but I could see enough subtle little literary allusions to realise there must be many more there. Also some that I suspect may just be looking too hard, but oh well - they didn't detract anything from the book....
I love the broad ambition of this story, the multiple levels it runs on, and the ease with which Gaiman can switch between those levels. It suffers a little from trying to pack too much in. By the end I was a bit tired of new characters being introduced without development, and wishing a few of the subplots had been explored better. It's both telling and a good move that when Gaiman wrote a ~sequel (Anansi Boys) he picked up one of the second-tier characters from American Gods, fleshed him out beautifully, and told a much more focussed story with him. Anansi Boys ends up being a stronger book as a result.
A few references I'm wondering about:
About halfway through part one, there seemed to be a subtle allusion to Eliot's Journey Of The Magi. I'm not sure if it's either intended or real, but read or listen to the poem: www.poetryarchive.org/poem/journey-magi - it seems to fit, eh?
One thing I was left not understanding at the end was why Wednesday needed Shadow. It seemed that he could have orchestrated the whole con at less risk without Shadow involved, which was the one thing I found unsatisfying about the otherwise very clever ending. I read somewhere that Monarch Of The Glen explains more about who Shadow is, so I'm looking forward to reading that.
The two-man con idea feels like a wonderfully biting allegory about US politics. If so, then Gaiman was pretty prescient - it's a thing that has become much more obvious since.
The two-man con and its motivations also feels like an allegory about the "Clash of Civilizations" nonsense that has potential to be so self-fulfilling. I'm pretty sure this on my mind because I happen to have read the book in a week when anti-Muslim attacks in the US are more prominent in the news than usual, but I wonder if it wasn't also an intended message, given that the book was first published in 2001. But then... that crap didn't get much airtime until 9/11, and this book must have mostly been written before that.
And finally, I really want to learn more about Sammy Black Crow. I was expecting her to be more significant in the end.
This was a very interesting concept and a pretty good book. It's not among my favorites, but I can't quite point to anything that was particularly disappointing. Maybe I just felt a bit disconnected with the story having never lived or traveled through middle America.
Overall though, it's a good book and good read.
