Anansi Boys

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.

This was a re-read just because I adore the Lenny Henry audiobook, and BBC just released a radio play based on the book, with all sorts of awesome actors, including Lenny! Wanted to refresh my memory before listening to that.

This was every bit as fun as I remembered. I have so much affection for Charlie, and love how his character develops. But all the characters are delightful, from the mischievous Anansi to the odious Grahame Coats; from the earnest and fun Daisy (Evildoers beware!) to Rosie's mum, who lives on vitaminized water, rye crackers, and spite (but turns out pretty awesome in her own way).

If you've ever enjoyed Brer Rabbit or Bugs Bunny, or if you've ever wondered what your personal theme song was, or if you just love stories, go read this! (Or better yet, let Lenny read it to you.)

This was so much fun. Nice blend of fantasy (modern-day) and comedy. Charlie is a relatable character who fears embarrassment more than anything. He avoids drawing attention to himself at all costs. But the price he pays is never getting to shine and share with the world what he's really good at (in this case singing.)

Charlie's character grows thanks to adversity, in the form of his brother Spider, and his crooked boss Grahame. His supposedly dead father ( the West African trickster god Anansi) helps him gain confidence and sense of purpose. I wish things worked out like this in real life. It's such a joyful story to read. Favorite scenes include Charlie singing his way out of a jam with a gun-toting lunatic and Spider making a little clay spider that goes and gets help from all the other spiders.

One theme in this book is the power of stories. When the destructive force (Tiger) owned all the stories, humans were frightened and spent all their time struggling for their survival. When Spider takes over the stories, suddenly humans are freer to make their lives easier, do the things they want instead of living in fear. The story explores the Tiger (fear) trying to take the stories back.

I received a copy of this from the publisher via Edelweiss+ in exchange for my open and honest review.

American Gods, Vol 2 My Ainsel has the dubious task of portraying the middle of a book. Often when reading a story, the center is the boring part. The part that is not the exciting beginning or the escalating and profound conclusion. No. The middle is the part where the characters walk. If you are reading Lord of the Rings, odds are they are walking. It is significant but taken as a slice of the bigger narrative pie; the walking is boring.

Not so much with My Ainsel.

Don't get me wrong; this slice of the narrative is not as exciting as the first American Gods Vol. 1. Or, dare say, will it be as impressive as the not-yet-written Vol. 3 as the denument of the American Gods book plays out. But, this story was an exciting and faithful adaptation of Neil Gaiman's much-beloved novel. Oddly enough, instead of walking, this is the story of a long road trip. It is a vital part of the narrative, a needed pause. The characters, mainly Shadow and Wednesday, circle the wagons and gather the forces. The story also chronicles Shadow's time in Lakeside and touches on the parallel dimension that is accessible to gods. Because the narrative is pausing, the artwork has to do the heavy lifting to progress the story forward and create compelling visuals. I think that this is where the volume shines. The artwork is beautiful. I am a fan of Gaiman's comic style, expressive, artistic, and a touch wonky. It isn't perfect. Some of the character renderings are a bit off. For example, the young girls Shadow interacts with on a bus ride look much older than their 14 years. It can throw the reader out of the story. I did appreciate the depictions of Las Vegas as they were colorful and otherworldly. They are what someone thinks Vegas should look like, and in that way are useful. Although, as someone from Vegas I always find depictions of Vegas as some kaleidoscope adult dream world a description that lacks in imagination. But, in terms of the story, I liked the scene quite a bit.

Overall, this adaptation was excellent. It wasn't perfect; it had slight pacing, art, and story issues. But as far as a middle goes, it excelled. It did the original story justice, and undoubtedly will bring more American Gods fans into the fold.

I am looking forward to the third volume to see the artwork and how it further adapts the source material. If you are new to the series, congratulations, stay awhile. American Gods is a treat.

As a side note and a bit of cleverness on Neil Gaiman's part, My Ainsel is a Northumbrian folk tale and means My own self. I doubt that was a coincidence. 

Totally different from American Gods, but still really enjoyable (as usual with Neil Gaiman). This is some a classic story of two brothers getting to know each other and their differences, sprinkled by mythology, music and a lot of jokes, which made it quite different. Fat Charly, the main protagonist, starts by being quite a loser but you grow fond of him as the pages are turning, and same goes for his brother Spider, in quite a different way. The whole book is full of music, and will leave you with a bright smile on your face.

4 star book that gets an extra one for the absolutely brilliant Lenny Henry reading in the audible version. It is not American Gods #2, it is a much lighter and funnier spin off of a minor (In AG) God, but it has its roots firmly in London and the Caribbean via a bunch of Florida biddies, all gloriously interpreted by Lenny Henry.

Anansi Boys is one of the most humorous and wonderfully crafted books I have read in ages. Neil Gaiman is in phenomenal form here and the book is like a dream combination of Robert Rankin's off-the-wall humor, Terry Pratchett's wit and Neil Gaiman's take on life, the universe and everything.

There is not a single moment that I was bored or zoned out while reading Anansi Boys. Every single page is dripping with character and every sentence drags you onwards without pausing for breath.

I can highly recommend this to anyone who is in any way in the slightest a Gaiman fan as well as anyone who is in search of a gripping, funny, serious, wonderful story of family, gods and fantastical stories.

This was so strange. But in a very good way. My first Gaiman read and I completely enjoyed it. Although it was a bit slow in the middle - but the last third was so awsome with all those connections taking place that it made up for the slightly stagnated story in the middle part.
And my favorit character: The Lime - I mean how could I choose anything else?

Overall a very fun read with weird twists and turns and in my opinion a great book to get into Neil's writing.

I first became aware of Neil Gaiman a couple of years back when he was a panelist on Cranky Geeks. His novels and he are mentioned a lot on a few of the podcasts that I listen to and I decided to give Anansi Boys a try. I got the audiobook from audible and this one is narrated by Lenny Henry. I enjoyed it immensely and will definitely be consuming some more of Neil Gaiman's novels before long.

This one is about the descendent of Anansi, the Spider God. His descendent, Fat Charlie, does not know that he's descended from a God to begin with. He's just a regular schmo working for a firm in London and dating his fiancée. After he hears about his father's death, he attends the funeral and that's when strange things start to happen.

Lenny Henry was the perfect choice as narrator for this novel. A lot of the characters are Carribean in style and he does the accents perfectly.

The novel is funny, clever and engaging. Four stars.

Executive Summary: A pretty solid follow-up to [b:American Gods 30165203 American Gods Neil Gaiman https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1462924585s/30165203.jpg 1970226]. I'd happily do another book set in this series.Audiobook: Lenny Henry was fantastic. He speaks clearly and will good inflection, and does a variety of voices that really add that little extra something to the book that only a good narrator can.Full ReviewWe were discussing great narrators at a recent book club meeting, and this book came up as a result. I'm not sure what I didn't listen to it closer to when I did [b:American Gods 30165203 American Gods Neil Gaiman https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1462924585s/30165203.jpg 1970226]. Probably because American Gods is one of the very first audio books I ever did back in the days before I discovered GoodReads and Audible.It started a bit slow, but once things got going I was hooked. I spent most of the first half of the book debating who was worse, Charlie's brother, his boss or his future mother in law. This book is not lacking for terrible people. In fact Charlie seems to be surrounded by them.My memories of American Gods are pretty hazy at this point. I only vaguely remember Mr. Nancy, and for awhile I was confusing him with Mr. Wednesday and Spider with Shadow. Once I got into the book though, some of the world building at least came back to me.I liked Charlie, maybe because I could identify with him quite a bit. I certainly felt bad for him and all the terrible things other people kept doing with him. I did like his character development as the story went on.That isn't to say there are no other good characters. I quite liked Daisy as well. In fact she may be my favorite character in the book. I'm not sure her and I would get along, but then I guess I'm a bit surprised that her and Charlie did.This story took a few turns I didn't really expect. I wasn't sure where the story was going. For awhile it just seemed like Mr. Gaiman really hated some guy named Charlie and this book was his way of taking out that aggression. Apart from the very beginning however, I don't recall ever being bored by it. It's a bit like a train wreck. You shouldn't watch it, but it can be hard to turn away.Overall, I found this one a lot of fun, and I'm glad I finally picked it up.

I really enjoy reading Gaiman's prose and I think he excels at combining multiple genre's till you have a book that is really hard to categorize as it checks so many different boxes. This novel appeals to me on that level and I had a good time with the overall plot/characters. If I had to sum it up I would used the word “solid”. Nothing blew me away and I'd rate it a slightly lower than American Gods , (3.5 compared to 4) but a solid novel that was interesting despite me not being very emotionally invested in the characters.

As far as the comedy goes, which this book is marketed heavily as being humorous, Gaiman just doesn't do it for me. Not only do I tend to not find him funny, but often times it's lost on me that he's even attempting to be funny. So it's not that the joke doesn't land (although sometimes this is true), it's that I often don't see the joke to begin with. I don't really hold that against Gaiman though because that's not a reflection on his writing in any way, it's just something that I ironically find amusing.

If you are looking for a really good story, and by story i mean a tale like a “grown up and flown away come into its own grown old and left the one last greatest and most profound moral of all” fable... read any of Neil Gaimans' novels or short stories or writings of any kind.

I absolutely loved this book, much as i love everything Neil writes. He is a born storyteller and it certainly shows. I have read many reviews saying that although this was a terrific book, American Gods will always be better. I haven't read that one yet, i have no clue what drove me to read this one first as the other one technically is the first book, but i know it will be amazing.

I started this book ages ago and read a couple chapters and let it sit until life had calmed down, i sat down the other day and read it all in one day. I shouldn't do that because i inevitably will miss many parts. I didnt mind this time because i will 100% absatively be reading this many more times in the future.

I absolutely loved this book!This was the first audiobook I had ever read (listened to?). Lenny Henry was an absolutely incredible narrator and I've got to say, I think I might be a little hooked on audiobooks now.As for the story itself... it's Neil. ‘Nuff said.The plot was so intriguing and strange. Personally, I preferred this book to [b:American Gods 30165203 American Gods Neil Gaiman https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1462924585s/30165203.jpg 1970226] , however, that book is also amazing. I also don't feel as though you need to read American Gods to read this- it's less of a sequel than it is a companion novel.It revolves around this guy, Fat Charlie, who finds out that his father is a god and he has this long-lost brother. So he decides to meet his brother, Spider, and things go disastrously wrong. The book is extremely humorous, which was only enhanced by Henry's interpretation of the novel. It is also engaging, and I was always trying to figure out times when I could fit in a little audiobooking. If that is even a valid verb.I loved all of the characters. Fat Charlie, Spider, Rosie, Daisy, Tiger... you name it. They were all wholly unique and very interesting to read about. Their relationships were also very tangled, like a web (Ha! Get it?).I loved this book. It was mysterious, and weird, and strange, and everything I love about Neil Gaiman. I certainly recommend it to anyone who is looking for a bizarre fiction novel that will make them smile and even chuckle.

This is the fourth book I read by Neil Gaiman and for me was IMO the best of his solo performances (one of the books being Good Omen, together with Terry Pratchett). The book nicely mingles a contemporary world with old stories, believes and myths. It's very well and light-heartedly written. I enjoy how self-conscious the characters are about themselves and their actions, though they tend to make similar mistakes repeatedly. Homo sum et nihil humanum ... as they say. An enjoyable read and highly recommended if you look for something lighter but also witty and not without a meaning. A story of stories which joins threads as a spider's web ;) (it's not a spoiler)