American Gods
A Novel
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Released from prison, Shadow finds his world turned upside down. His wife has been killed; a mysterious stranger offers him a job. But Mr. Wednesday, who knows more about Shadow than is possible, warns that a storm is coming -- a battle for the very soul of America . . . and they are in its direct path.
One of the most talked-about books of the new millennium, American Gods is a kaleidoscopic journey deep into myth and across an American landscape at once eerily familiar and utterly alien. It is, quite simply, a contemporary masterpiece.
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Author Extras
Reading Guides:
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Awards for American Gods |
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Hugo Award for Best SF/Fantasy Novel
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Hugo Award for Best SF/Fantasy Novel
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Critical Praise for
American Gods
“Mystery, satire, sex, horror, poetic prose -- American Gods uses all these to keep the reader turning the pages . . . the story accelerates crisply toward a surprise ending . . . if you have enjoyed, say, John Crowley’s Little, Big or Stephen King’s The Stand or the urbane horror fiction of Jonathan Carroll . . . then American Gods arrives just in time.”
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Michael Dirda, The Washington Post
“Gaiman returns to the fertile killing ground that nourished The Sandman: that peculiarly American crossroads where pop culture intersects with religion, violence and death.”
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Village Voice Literary Supplement
“Provocative yet fun . . . Gaiman has applied his vast breadth of knowledge about all things mythological to a truly high concept . . . . American Gods works because of Gaiman’s singular control over the proceedings, his nimble and intelligent voice, and his gift for painting spectacle and splashing big themes across his canvas.”
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Entertainment Weekly
“A fascinating tale . . . by turns thoughtful, hilarious, disturbing, uplifting, horrifying and enjoyable -- and sometimes all at once, in a curious sort of way. Those who are familiar with Gaiman’s earlier work will find a satisfying yarn by a familiar master storyteller. Those who are meeting him for the first time may be surprised at just how good he is.”
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St. Louis Post-Dispatch
“AMERICAN GODS is a crackerjack suspense yarn with an ending that both surprises and makes perfect sense, as well as many passages of heady, imagistic writing . . . Gaiman has exactly nailed the way we talk . . . AMERICAN GODS is a juicily original melding of archaic myth with the slangy, gritty, melancholy voice of one of America’s great cultural inventions -- the hard-boiled detective; call it Wagnerian noir.”
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Salon.com
“An explanation and exploration of sorts into this strange country of ours . . . the brilliance of AMERICAN GODS comes with Gaiman’s realization that gods might just need a mythology too.”
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Daily Californian
“AMERICAN GODS is nothing short of an odyssey; Shadow’s journey is an epic one . . . Gaiman employs his rich skills in weaving the everyday and the otherworldly to create a fascinating tapestry of characters and stories. The voices of these characters and stories, these humans and gods, tall tales and myths, are as engrossing as they are variegated. . . . Gaiman shows readers that wisdom can be found in all kinds of tales. . . Reading AMERICAN GODS gives the feeling of having really gone somewhere -- and back.”
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Science Fiction Weekly (http://www.scifi.com)
“A magical modern Adventures of Huckleberry Finn . . . . this book will astonish you on every page, and at the same time have you believing every word. You’ll stay up late to finish and then be sorry when it’s done.”
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Tim Powers, author of Declare
“American Gods is some kind of miracle. Gaiman has managed to tell the tallest of tales in the most believable fashion, despite the story’s truly mythic scale. It is an important, essential book.”
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Jonathan Carroll
American Gods is sexy, thrilling, dark, funny and poetic."
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Teller, of Penn & Teller
“Original, engrossing, and endlessly inventive; a picaresque journey across America where the travelers are even stranger than the roadside attractions.”
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George R. R. Martin
“American Gods has poignancy, terror, nobility, magic, sacrifice, wisdom, mystery, heartbreak, and a real emotional richness and grandeur that emerge from masterful storytelling.”
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Peter Straub
"American Gods is like a fast run downhill through a maze -- both exhilarating and twisted."
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Jane Lindskold, author of Changer and
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Stories
"The joy of fiction is the joy of the imagination. . . ." The best stories pull readers in and keep them turning the pages, eager to discover more—to find the answer to the question: "And then what happened?" The true hallmark of great literature is great imagination, and as Neil Gaiman and Al...
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Instructions
Trust Dreams. Trust your heart, and trust your story. A renowned storyteller whose words have transported readers to magical realms and an acclaimed illustrator of lushly imagined fairy-tale landscapes guide a traveler safely through lands unknown and yet strangely familiar . . . . . . and home...
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Odd and the Frost Giants
In this inventive, short, yet perfectly formed novel inspired by traditional Norse mythology, Neil Gaiman takes readers on a wild and magical trip to the land of giants and gods and back. In a village in ancient Norway lives a boy named Odd, and he's had some very bad luck: His father perished in...
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