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Loading... Anansi Boys (original 2005; edition 2005)by Neil Gaiman
Work InformationAnansi Boys by Neil Gaiman (2005)
  
Best Fantasy Novels (102) Best Urban Fantasy (45) » 42 more Magic Realism (41) Top Five Books of 2013 (176) Comfort Reads (68) Books with Twins (2) Page Turners (32) Top Five Books of 2014 (684) Top Five Books of 2021 (251) To Read (12) Books Read in 2015 (664) Books Read in 2016 (3,536) Books Read in 2013 (1,072) One Book, Many Authors (311) Books Read in 2005 (19) SHOULD Read Books! (38) Books on my Kindle (54) Books Read in 2006 (230) Books tagged favorites (288) Protagonists - Men (10) Speculative Fiction (18) Books Read in 2014 (2,156) Fiction For Men (139) Unread books (878) Biggest Disappointments (553) No current Talk conversations about this book. It takes a little while to get into the book, but once you get into the meat of it, you just have to find out what happens to the main character "Fat Charlie." Charlie's life just changed for boringly normal and quiet to a whirlwind ride. Not only does his father, whom he wasn't all that close to, die, but he finds out that he also has a long lost brother! Enter all of the other main characters off on their own tangents and the story soon spins into a web that mirrors the character that the book is really about. Good reading, if a little slow to start. (  ) LinBee83 | Aug 23, 2023 |  Let no one say that Neil Gaiman is not the king of urban fantasy. Certainly, Anansi Boys does nothing to bring his title under dispute; however, as a fan of American Gods, I found myself missing the darker, grittier tone of the latter. Anansi Boys is excellent, but will not meet the expectations of readers looking for American Gods redux. (  ) settingshadow | Aug 19, 2023 | I love this audiobook. Lenny Henry, the story, the characters, all of it. My third listen and still discovered some things I had previously missed. (  ) beentsy | Aug 12, 2023 | I have a tremendous amount of respect for Neil Gaiman, and have greatly enjoyed his short stories and graphic novel work. I've had a harder time getting into his novels, though. His writing has what in my mind is a very British quality to it, in that the characters often come across as more whimsical caricatures than real people. I find them amusing for a short while, but have a hard time investing enough emotionally to be carried through a longer tale. All this is just to qualify why I didn't like this book more than I did ... but I did like it quite a bit. While Anansi Boys does, at some points, fail to grip me the way I would hope, in just as many cases it was very successful. More than simply having things work out by the end, I feel like the primary characters have learned something valuable, that they have truly evolved in the course of the narrative, and done so in a believable way. For me, this is a fundamental quality of good fiction, and the fact that Anansi Boys succeeds here is why, by a large margin, it is my favorite Gaiman novel so far. ( ) JayBostwick | Jul 11, 2023 | I have a tremendous amount of respect for Neil Gaiman, and have greatly enjoyed his short stories and graphic novel work. I've had a harder time getting into his novels, though. His writing has what in my mind is a very British quality to it, in that the characters often come across as more whimsical caricatures than real people. I find them amusing for a short while, but have a hard time investing enough emotionally to be carried through a longer tale. All this is just to qualify why I didn't like this book more than I did ... but I did like it quite a bit. While Anansi Boys does, at some points, fail to grip me the way I would hope, in just as many cases it was very successful. More than simply having things work out by the end, I feel like the primary characters have learned something valuable, that they have truly evolved in the course of the narrative, and done so in a believable way. For me, this is a fundamental quality of good fiction, and the fact that Anansi Boys succeeds here is why, by a large margin, it is my favorite Gaiman novel so far. ( ) JayBostwick | Jul 11, 2023 |
 Gaiman kutoo tapansa mukaan sujuvan ja houkuttelevan kertomuksen, joka ammentaa tarinoiden ja myyttien maailmasta. Sujuvan lukukokemuksen viimeistelee onnistunut suomennos. Gaimaniin mieltyneille Hämähäkkijumala on puolipakollinen kirjahyllyn täyte ja kevytfantasiaa hakeville ihan yhtä hyvä tutustumiskirja kuin mikä tahansa varhaisempi romaani. Vaikka kirjan juoni ei juuri yllätäkään, Gaiman esittelee tarinankertojan lahjaansa: kykyä tehdä mahdottomasta todenmakuista.  And Charlie, who has become a successful singer and fathered a son, has come to terms with the powers and responsibilities of ''a boy who was half a god," having learned what Gaiman knows better, and communicates more forcefully, than any other contemporary writer: Stories and poems, songs and myths, represent us, sustain and complete us, and survive us, while also ensuring that all that's best in us survives with them. The focus on Anansi and tricksters, I think, goes a long way towards explaining the tone of this novel. It really feels more like some of the established "funny" sci-fi/fantasy authors (like Gaiman's Good Omens co-author Terry Pratchett) than "classic" Neil.  The problem in "Anansi Boys" is the type of fantasy Gaiman has chosen. The tales of Anansi outwitting his foes leave you feeling you've eaten something heavy and sugary. There's an Uncle Remus folksiness to the stories that sends the airy blitheness of the farce plummeting down to earth. There is also, I regret to say, the warm hand of instruction lying uneasily on this tale. Charlie works through his ineffectualness and his family issues to find happiness, contentment and - ugh - acceptance. It leaves you with the uncomfortable feeling that for Gaiman, farce by itself would simply have been too frivolous, that he feels the need to impart a lesson. Anansi Boys contains a couple of traditional-style Anansi fables, and the book itself takes a similar ambling but wry, pointed tone; like any good Anansi story, it's about cleverness, appetite, and comeuppance, and it's funny in a smart, inclusive way. And like any good Gaiman book, it's about the places where the normal world and a fantastic one intersect, and all the insightful things they have to say about each other.
Fiction.
HTML: When Fat Charlie's dad named something, it stuck. Like calling Fat Charlie "Fat Charlie." Even now, 20 years later, Charlie Nancy can't shake that name, one of the many embarrassing "gifts" his father bestowed-before he dropped dead on a karaoke stage and ruined Fat Charlie's life. Because Mr. Nancy left Fat Charlie things. Things like the tall, good-looking stranger who appears on Charlie's doorstep, who appears to be the brother he never knew. A brother as different from Charlie as night is from day, a brother who's going to show Charlie how to lighten up and have a little fun. And all of a sudden, things start getting very interesting for Fat Charlie. Exciting, scary, and deeply funny, Anansi Boys is a kaleidoscopic journey deep into myth, a wild adventure, as Neil Gaiman shows us where gods come from, and how to survive your family. .No library descriptions found. 
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 Google Books — Loading...GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.54Literature English (North America) American fiction 20th Century 1945-1999LC ClassificationRatingAverage: (3.93)
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