Neverwhere

[flemmings]

Um yes. So I finished my Neverwhere disk and then googled the rest of the series, saw what was going to happen and said No wai. And took the DVDs back, with Infernal Affairs unwatched but-of-course.

However I saw there's a Neverwhere book and I considered getting it, except avalonjones thought it twee. Somehow I couldn't reconcile twee with the horrors promised in part 2, though I'm sure Gaiman could manage it if anyone could. But I thought, yanno, I *would* kinda like to see more of the Marquis... And then both these ideas fused and I experienced satori. I'd thought there was something slightly off in the Marquis' delivery, as though he were singing a familiar song half a tone flat, or whatever it was Vaughn Williams used to do to murder English folk songs. But it wasn't Joseph's delivery, which was spot on. It was Gaiman being his own brand of arch and insufferable. Yes I know mileage varies on this, but the little I've read of his fiction rubs me the wrong way precisely because of the knowing tone.

The oddity of Gaiman is that the tone of his *blog* is perfect: detached, reasonable, civil, friendly, someone you'd be happy to know as a person. Which makes him different from all the other writers who've caused me to say that writers shouldn't keep blogs, a position that's been miserably validated this year. However.

However. Yesterday was a miserable day in TO, an afternoon of headaches and irritability and screaming infings, and *my* day didn't end until 8. Bicycled home in the drizzle and passed Brunswick Ave and a voice said But there *is* a novel, so I cut up Brunswick to BMV. Which never has what I want except when I shouldn't buy it (its collection of Chinese textbooks is particularly notable in this respect) so of course it had a copy of Neverwhere. Which I bought. Am trusting that the memory of the live action charas will ameliorate their presentation in the book.

Not that most of the series characters knocked me over or anything. But oh sweet lord British English is music to the ear after what I normally hear in this town. (Not true: normally I hear a cornucopia of ESL accents and the best Canuck can get, which is Maritimes. But on the street I run into the full Toronto male bray and female tinny, projected from the roof of the mouth. Truly, you'd think half the white women here had no lungs, because they sure don't use them when they talk.) There are few North American accents one can call musical, so Gary Bakewell's lilting Scots-or-whatever (because to my ears it still sounded like the Beatles used to do) was a reminder of what English *can* sound like. It could still have used subtitles, says the tin-eared Canuck in this corner who couldn't hear the difference between a tone 1 and a tone 4 if it came up and bit her.

Also must note that my terribly useful Chinese textbooks were bought for what textbooks cost back in the 60s, which is always a pleasure.

Comments

[petronia.livejournal.com]

FWIW Neverwhere is my clear favorite of Gaiman's novels. (The shorter the format, the better he does by me, although if you're trying to avoid horrors...)

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

Printed horrors I can kind of live with as long as we're not cutting off children's hands and tying them to wheels to die of exposure. (I will never never never EVER read another word Guy Gavriel Kay types.) And I take your rec as a rec, since you're the only other 'I don't quite get the Gaiaman thing' person I know.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

If you know only one "I don't quite get the Gaiman thing" person it's probably bravecows, actually, not me. XD I've read and liked-not-loved all his novels plus Sandman, and I think he's an excellent short story writer (as a corollary they tend to be more upsetting reads, although not always). He may be better at children's lit than adult too, come to think of it.

Edited to note - psychologically upsetting. Gaiman doesn't really do the axe murder sort of horror, but even watching the film version of Coraline I was near tears half the time. (At the same time I could perceive - and this is the standard warning on that particular book - that for a child in the target age range it would be a straightforward fantasy adventure story and not upsetting at all.)

[i-am-zan.livejournal.com]

jumping in here - apologies ... I was saying yes I liked Sandman even if they weren't always happy ... I do like his children's lit. more and ( I haven't read the newer ones) but I quite enjoyed The Day I swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Day-Swapped-Dad-Two-Goldfish/dp/0747575185) and The Wolves in the Walls (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Wolves-Walls-Neil-Gaiman/dp/0747574723/ref=pd_sim_b_1) ... and and there is a film version of Coraline? Already? Wow that was ... fast! My girl has read it ... she's nine and she did not seem upset at all!

I have both Coraline and The Graveyard Book. But the girl and hubby pounced on Coraline and the boy (6 and a half) is reading 'Graveyard'.

Ahhh sorry for the interrupt.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Take your kids to see it! XD It's a gorgeously animated movie and I'd be surprised if it didn't win some awards at end of year.

Coraline is only upsetting to adults because the trigger is the sense of not being able to help a child in danger / "where is your child right now" / parental neglect/guilt/resentment. Even though I don't have children. ^^; If I were nine it wouldn't have upset me either.

[nekonexus.livejournal.com]

O.o wait, what? was this a short story or a novel of GGK's??

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

Novel. Tigana. Do not read unless prepared for massive throwing of books against walls urges.

[nekonexus.livejournal.com]

Have read. Have absolutely no memory of this. Perhaps not surprising as I tend to retain very little of content of GGK and yet get infected by writing tone. Hrm.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

I envy you the lack of memory. Truly, it's the only fictional thing I've read that I would give anything to have unread. Though I think that being infected by his writing tone must be worse. It isn't hideous or anything, but I've always found it indefinably chilly, and it stands between me and the action.

[tekalynn.livejournal.com]

I don't remember that exact moment either, but it sounds like one of Alberico's atrocities. I do remember that he used the wheel for punishment.

[i-am-zan.livejournal.com]

hmm never watched the series nor read the book ... and although I liked his Sandman stories well enough, and those shorter graphic stories aimed at a younger set ...I don't know if I can read a novel without the visual presentation. If that makes sense.

Looking forward - as always - to see what you have to say about it!

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

Gaiman's narrative voice reads to me arch and frequently 'too clever for my own good' insufferable. Whatever it was about it that struck avalonjones as twee struck me that way too. The Marquis' dialogue, a lot of it, is insufferable, and if I saw it written on a page rather than hearing it in Joseph's voice, I might hear it as arch as well.

[nekonexus.livejournal.com]

Have read Neverwhere. As with American Gods, liked individual premises, but execution of overall plot left me "meh". ... and most of it has since fallen out of my head, except for Door.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

I can see that execution might leave you Meh. It hangs together very well for a filmed series but is kind of random for a piece of prose.

[avalonjones.livejournal.com]

It was "Stardust" that I'd read and not liked too awful much. That's the only Gaiman I've read so far--after my reaction to that one, I'm not exactly eager to go read more, just in case I react the same way to all of it. I know so many people who think so highly of his work--and I'd hate to be the one person who doesn't!

And I really like Guy Gavriel Kay, although I have to agree with nekonexus and say that I don't recall that specific incident in that book. That wasn't necessarily one of my favorites, though.

[flemmings.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I realized part way through that Neverwhere was quite on the level and lacked The Tone, so figured it must have been another one-worder that put you off.

The GGK was a throwaway, something about 'the children had finally stopped screaming-- they lasted longer on the wheel than adults.' Wossis has had his guards round up random citizenry in retaliation for something and doesn't discriminate on the basis of age or sex. Kay likes his gore and his horrors, and IMO includes them gratuitously; so no, I'll never read him again.