STARDUST by Neil Gaiman

Faerie, a vast land beyond the small village of Wall, where all manner of beings and creatures exist. Tristan Thorn, an enthusiastic young man, set out on a journey through this enchanted land to find the fallen star that will bring him his heart’s desire. Little did he know that his fated journey was exactly just that and perhaps more.

Gaiman did a fantastic job of creating a very charming adult fairy tale. A delicious plot that will draw you into a mystic fairyland and expand your imagination - of witches, and far-off kingdoms, and magic. His words are pure and simple, and yet they are timeless and unbounded. He made his characters significant in a way that you can vividly picture them in your head. I was amazed by how he mingled the sub-plots and fused them all together in the end. The story is a good illustration of how the hands of Fate works. A wonderful story!

I just wish he did tell what happened to the little hairy man.

Book detail:

Title:  Stardust

Author:  Neil Gaiman

Published: HarperCollins, December 23, 2008

Genre: Fantasy

Rating: ★★★★

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THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE by Neil Gaiman

Childhood Memories

   THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE opens its pages to George, a middle-aged man trying to escape the doldrums of a funeral. He found himself driving through the places of his youth long gone, and then instinct led him to the Hempstock Farm, that huge farm at the end of the lane. There, he started remembering memories from his childhood -buried and forgotten.  A childhood touched by strangeness and terror, but also by love and redemption.

“Childhood memories are sometimes covered and obscured beneath the things that come later, like childhood toys forgotten at the bottom of a crammed adult closet, but they are never lost for good.”

It is no secret that Neil Gaiman is one of my favorite authors.  He understands fairytales in a way no other author had keenly defined the relationship between his characters and readers through its horrors.  He can make his stories felt real; it was fantasy and yet the reader can feel that it happened, or verily wish it will.  Gaiman never departs from the fairytale design; he always starts with a protagonist faced with a strange force that has the power to overturn his life into chaos and loss.  There will be difficult challenges, a call for courage, and by the end of the story, there will be redemption.  The journey through the story is a kaleidoscope of images, worth taking, and wonderful.  And, he insists that every ending is a “happily ever after” but only if we make it so.

 “Adult stories never made sense, and they were slow to start. They made me feel like there were secrets, Masonic, mythic secrets, to adulthood.”

There was one terrifying question in the story: “How can you be happy in this world?”  We adults often look at life challenges like viewing a vast ocean, when sometimes it will only take a bucketful of water to understand it.

"I saw the world I had walked since my birth, and I understood how fragile it was, that the reality I knew was a thin layer of icing on a great dark birthday cake writhing with grubs and nightmares and hunger."

The book was narrated in an adult’s voice, but it will drive the readers to connect with the child they tried so hard to hide within them.  THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE is an example of Neil Gaiman’s genius.  The temptation to spoil the story is so strong whenever I talk about this book.  Once I start, I don’t want to stop telling people why they should read it.  And if it wasn't enough, I urge them to listen to it too.

“Adults follow paths. Children explore. Adults are content to walk the same way, hundreds of times, or thousands; perhaps it never occurs to adults to step off the paths, to creep beneath rhododendrons, to find the spaces between fences. I was a child, which meant that I knew a dozen different ways of getting out of our property and into the lane, ways that would not involve walking down our drive.”

Book Details:
Title: The Ocean a the End of the Lane
Author: Neil Gaiman
Publisher: William Morrow
Genre: YA Fiction

Rating:  ★★★★★

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F2F25, January 2014, The Appraisery
Moderated by Tina
Photo courtesy of Joy Abundo

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SOUP REVIEWS | 1

Children's Books

The Wolves in the Wall by Neil Gaiman

The artwork spent on this book will surely get the reader’s attention.  I spent more time inspecting each picture than reading the whole story.  There’s a certain oddness to them that most people would think them disturbing; but if parents would want to wean their kids into good art, this is something to start them with.  Dave McKean did a great job with this one.

This was a Finalist in the 2003 Bram Stoker Award, Work for Young Readers.  The story deals with how kids can sometimes be carried away by their imagination, and how those imaginations led them to fear.  The lesson lies in how kids should learn how to be the hero in conquering their own fear.  Sometimes accomplishing that just needs further imagination, motivation, and a lungful of bravery.

Book Details:
Title: The Wolves in the Wall
Author: Neil Gaiman
Publisher: HarperCollins
Rating: ★★★

From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg

This is one of those stories I wished the movies got exactly right.  The book received the Newbery Medal in 1968; and the William Allen White Children's Book Award in 1970.  So, it seems a waste of film not to give it justice.

Claudia dragged her brother Jaime into running away from their home because she believed that her family does not appreciate her.  And then, she decided to be the hero to prove that the statue of the Angel was an authentic Michelangelo.  In short, she no longer wants to be that same reliable Claudia who does the laundry, the dishes, and takes out the trash when she comes back home. She wants to be the important Claudia, appreciated by everyone.  Besides, she thought, running away is the greatest adventure there is.

The first lesson, I believe, goes to the parents.  We parents are not given kids as an extension of ourselves, to be an additional adult to take care of things in the house, while we are busy making a life for ourselves.  It is never wrong to teach our kids chores, but we have to remember that our kids are entrusted to us, so we should take care of them, not the other way around.

The second lesson is best described by this passage:

“I think you should learn, of course, and some days you must learn a great deal.  But you should also have days when you allow what is already in you to swell up inside of you until it touches everything.  And you can feel it inside you.  If you never take time out to let that happen, then you just accumulate facts, and they begin to rattle around inside of you.  You can make noise with them, but never really feel anything with them.  It’s hollow.”

Book Details:
Title: From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler
Author: E.L. Konigsburg
Publisher: Atheneum Books for Young Readers
Rating: ★★★★★

Hope Was Here by Joan Bauer

The story begins with a teenage girl, named Tulip, but she had the good sense to dub herself Hope and made it legal eventually.  The thing is, you have to live-up with that sort of big name, and Hope sure did.

There is so much juice in this book. The story of love, hope and strength all neatly tied up within 186 pages.  Joan Bauer did a nifty job developing the characters and the events throughout the book.  I felt them between each setting and dialogue.

The sense of never-giving-up-no-matter-what is written all over.  Every character had their own issue to take care of, and unwavering hope was their key to each and everything.  The story also speaks of accepting the end –everything ends.  It was not about mourning what we lost, but appreciating what we had, and drawing strength from memories made.

This is a very inspiring read, no wonder it was made into a Newbery Honor Book in 2001.

Book Details:
Title:  Hope Was Here
Author: Joan Bauer
Publisher: Puffin

Rating: ★★★★★

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