{"id":3143,"date":"2010-12-13T23:26:47","date_gmt":"2010-12-13T17:56:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bhagwad.com\/blog\/?p=3143"},"modified":"2010-12-16T20:21:20","modified_gmt":"2010-12-16T14:51:20","slug":"book-review-stardust-by-neil-gaiman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bhagwad.com\/blog\/2010\/book-reviews\/book-review-stardust-by-neil-gaiman.html\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: Stardust by Neil Gaiman"},"content":{"rendered":"

After reading Neil Gaiman’s “American Gods”<\/a>, I wanted to read more by this author so I picked up the first solo prose novel he wrote – Stardust. I wasn’t disappointed. There’s a certain way that Gaiman writes which isn’t standard fantasy fare.<\/p>\n

\"Stardust
Stardust by Neil Gaiman<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There’s something mythic<\/em> about his works and the type of plot choices he makes. He draws from figures which we’ve already been exposed to from various cultures and sources and makes a clean break from “sword and sorcery” novels which I’m very<\/em> thankful for. For example, we read about witches, unicorns and lions, and gnomes. I don’t know where he gets his ideas from, but they’re very imaginative – like the three old witches who live in a tumbled down house, but they have a mirror in which they’re always young and no one can say which is real and which is imaginary.<\/p>\n

I’m not really surprised by this level of imagination since I know he also wrote “The Sandman” series which is the story of Morpheus the King of Dreams. More than any other author I’ve read till date, Gaiman has the ability to create epic figures and his creations are richly unique.<\/p>\n

Stardust is a short novel. Half the size of a regular one, but like American Gods, the story is brisk, doesn’t waste time, and gets to the meat of the subject. I think Neil Gaiman is turning out to be my favorite fantasy author. If the story had a flaw, it’s that it had more than its fair share of coincidences – a plot technique that is vital to the story’s progression which makes is slightly unrealistic. Otherwise I enjoyed the three story arcs and how they converged.<\/p>\n

This little novel has won many awards and it’s obvious why. If you’re looking for an easy introduction to Neil Gaiman’s work, start with Stardust.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After reading Neil Gaiman’s “American Gods”, I wanted to read more by this author so I picked up the first solo prose novel he wrote – Stardust. I wasn’t disappointed. There’s a certain way that Gaiman writes which isn’t standard fantasy fare. There’s something mythic about his works and the type of plot choices he … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3146,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-book-reviews","category-sa"],"yoast_head":"\nBook Review: Stardust by Neil Gaiman<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Neil Gaiman's first prose novel "Stardust" is lovely and imaginative story. 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