Fragile Things: Short Fictions and Wonders

Позвольте мне рассказать вам историю... Нет, стойте, одной будет недостаточно.Еще одна попытка?Позвольте мне рассказать вам истории о месяцах года, о призраках и разбитом сердце, о страхе и желании. Позвольте мне рассказать вам о выпивке в неурочное время и о неотвеченных телефонных звонках, о добрых делах и паршивых днях, о разрушении и восстановлении, о прогулках мертвецов и потерянных отцах, о маленьких show more французских леди в Майами, о доверии волков и о том, как разговаривать с девочками.Есть истории внутри историй, нашептываемые в тишине ночи или выкрикиваемые в шуме дня, разыгрываемые между любовниками и врагами, незнакомцами и друзьями. Но все, все они - Хрупкие вещи, скроенные всего из 26 букв, переставляемых вновь и вновь, чтобы родились сказки и грезы. И если вы позволите им, они ослепят ваши чувства, растревожат ваше воображение и раскроют перед вами сокровенные глубины вашей д... show less

A bit of a mixed bag; some of the stories didn’t really do it for me - mostly these are because this isn’t my usual genre and I therefore didn’t get some of the references; the stories linked to Tori Amos’ albums or tours missed the mark for me too, because hers isn’t my kind of music. But on balance, the good stories are superb. I loved The Monarch of The Glen, the American Gods novella that rounds off this collections, and while I’m not in general a huge fan of poetry, the poems in this collection are delightful.

Short story collections tend to be pretty hit or miss for me. I adore Jhumpa Lahiri’s work, but have been disappointed by collections with numerous authors. To me, they often feel like scraps or half-baked ideas tossed together in no discernable order. But when they’re done right, each story works as a stand alone, but also flows well with the rest of the collection.

I’m a sucker for Gaiman’s work, because his stories have a way of getting under my skin, in a good way. I can’t say I loved Fragile Things, but I did love some of the individual stories it contains. Even when the story itself wasn’t memorable, some of his phrases or characters were, which is a testament to Gaiman’s skill as a storyteller.

There were some show more pieces I liked more than others. I didn’t care for “Keepsakes and Treasures,” but thought the Sherlock Holmes-inspired tale, “A Study in Emerald,” was wonderful. I loved “The Facts in the Case of the Departure of Miss Finch," which is cheerfully dark, an odd balance only Gaiman seems to be able to pull off.

Another good one was a, spooky story, which follows a boy who runs away from home and meets a ghost. It felt like a precursor for The Graveyard Book. Fragile Things also contains a poem that I love, “Instructions,” which has since been turned into an illustrated children’s book.

This collection is best known for two stories; one featuring Shadow, the main character from American Gods, and the other is about Susan from the Narnia books. To be honest, these sections were two of my least favorite in the book, neither really worked for me.

If you’re already a fan of Gaiman’s work, I’d recommend this collection. For those hoping to try something of his, don’t start here, instead try Stardust, The Graveyard Book or the marvelous audio version of Anansi Boys. show less

I tend to prefer my supernatural fiction "vintage", by which I understand that it should be written before 1950 and/or in the style of the classic ghost, gothic or horror story. Nevertheless, I do enjoy the occasional foray into the "New Weird". In December 2014 I had read and enjoyed China Mieville's [b:Looking for Jake and Other Stories|10755520|Looking for Jake and Other Stories|China Miéville|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1327942096s/10755520.jpg|895195] and, more recently, his other short story collection [b:Three Moments of an Explosion|24044142|Three Moments of an Explosion|China Miéville|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1426654001s/24044142.jpg|43365539]. Over Christmas 2015 I had opted for another anthology of short show more fiction: Neil Gaiman's Fragile Things. I am revisiting my review, now that the collection has been reprinted in the wake of the movie "How to talk to girls at parties"

I can't say I know Miéville and Gaiman well enough to compare them but, if forced to do so, I'd say Mieville strikes me as grittier and more politically committed, his style owing as much to noir and thriller genres as to the tradition of supernatural fiction. On the other hand, Gaiman seems more fascinated by the world of faerie, folk tale and myth; by the sometimes subtle, sometimes shocking intrusion of the weird into everyday life. Another recurrent inspiration in this collection appears to be the act of "writing" and "creating" itself. Not only is the anthology preceded by an introduction in which Gaiman explains the genesis of each of the pieces, but some of the stories themselves are either *about* writing, writers and storytellers, or else reinterpret known literary works. For instance, in the opening story - "A Study in Emerald" - the worlds of Conan Doyle and Lovecraft combine as Sherlock Holmes is placed in an alternative 19th Century ruled by "Old One" Queen Victoria. It's the sort of divertissement which shouldn't work but ultimately does. "The Problem of Susan" presents a more disturbing and abstruse reinterpretation of characters from the Chronicles of Narnia. "Forbidden Brides of the Faceless Slaves in the Secret House of the Night of Dread Desire" veers between parody and pastiche and features an author living in a typical candle-lit Gothic world of crumbling castles and stormy nights who is suffering from a particularly acute case of writer's block. A critic described this tale as "facetious nonsense" (which it probably is), but it is hilarious - after all, parody has always been an element of the Gothic tradition.

A highlight of the collection is "October in the Chair", in which, at a story-telling reunion between the months of the year, October relates the tale of a bullied boy who befriends a ghost. A prototype for [b:The Graveyard Book|2213661|The Graveyard Book|Neil Gaiman|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1303859949s/2213661.jpg|2219449] , it is touching and unsettling at the same time.

In other tales we meet child zombies, haunted playrooms, beautiful aliens and magical instruments. There is a return of "Shadow" from [b:American Gods|4407|American Gods (American Gods, #1)|Neil Gaiman|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1258417001s/4407.jpg|1970226] in the novella "Monarch of the Glen", where the protagonist finds himself pitted against a Grendel-like monster of old. In this story there is also a cameo appearance by the repulsive "Mr Smith and Mr Alice", who also get their own story - "Keepsakes and Treasures" is violent, quite revolting but strangely fascinating.

With such a varied anthology there will be entries which do not work for you. In my case, I didn't particularly like the poetry and there were stories which lost me because they seemed to lack an internal logic. Gaiman points out that supernatural tales are rarely "story-shaped", so others may actually relish the feeling of being "bewildered" by a seemingly illogical tale. I don't.

If Goodreads would allow me, I'd give this collection 3.5 stars. Instead, I'll opt for 4. I'll also make a mental note to venture into "New Weird" more often - possibly starting with some of Gaiman's and Mieville's full-length novels. show less

How to describe this collection of short stories by Neil Gaiman? Here's the thing - this is a really odd collection because it's contrary to how collections normally go. There weren't any stories that left me totally mesmerized, but there weren't really any that were total slouches either. Here's the strange part - the stories each separately would probably rate as 3 stars - but since they were all 3 stars I feel it brings the collection up a 1/2 star. Overall, Gaiman has a real storyteller talent - like I could picture him many lifetimes ago being a bard traveling the lands or a tribe's shaman keeping stories alive.

I really enjoyed this collection of stories. I listened to the audiobook version read by the author himself, which I think added quite a bit to the experience. It's been my experience that authors who read their own stories as audiobooks are generally not the best. While it's true that they know their characters and their stories, many of them just don't have the voice or talent for oral storytelling. That's not to say that the author isn't a storyteller - obviously they are, often they just shouldn't do it orally.

Neil Gaiman, thankfully, is a natural oral storyteller. He brings the story and the characters to life, and the listener forgets that they are listening to something that was once written because it feels so naturally spoken show more -- like the story is just flowing through him to us.

Many of these stories took me by surprise. I don't think of Gaiman as a YA author, but even so, I didn't expect the themes and details of the stories in this collection to be so jaded or brutal. Gaiman doesn't make these things the focus, but rather adds them in an almost nonchalant way that has more of an impact because it's NOT the focus.

I also really enjoy Gaiman's perspective and unique way of seeing the world and everything in it. I like his ability to effortlessly maneuver his readers right into the position we need to be in for maximum effect, and when we get there, he flips everything, so we're left wondering just what happened and how we got where we are when obviously we were just on our way to somewhere else.

I'm not much for poetry, and I didn't really get much out of the poems that were included here, so I couldn't give this one a 5 star rating, but aside from that, I loved this collection. It's a keeper. show less

Whenever a writer takes questions at a reading, an audience member inevitably asks, "Where do you get your ideas?" In the case of Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman's latest collection of short fiction and poetry, the question may be fair - ideas are very much on display - but his best work is driven by character and by the central question of popular fiction: What happens next? In other words, Neil Gaiman tells stories.

The half-dozen readers in America who still believe that genre means something might see Gaiman as the English answer to Stephen King, and might classify these tales as fantasy, as horror, as science fiction - more broadly as "weird tales," descendants of queer English ghost stories from the early decades of the last century. show more As if to confound these readers, Gaiman starts off the collection with "A Study in Emerald," a Hugo-winning collision between the worlds of Arthur Conan Doyle and H. P. Lovecraft. The story's narrator, a medical man who served with the British army in Afghanistan, neatly elides the difference between these two literary landscapes: show less