American Gods (Neil Gaiman)

American Gods. Book Review.

"I just keep thinking about Thor. You never knew him. Big guy, like you. Good hearted. Not bright, but he'd give you the goddamned shirt off his back if you asked him. And he killed himself. He put a gun in his mouth and blew his head off in Philadelphia in 1932. What kind of a way is that for a god to die?"

In American Gods. Neil Gaiman takes various myths, Norse, African, Welsh, Egypt, Indian (or Native Americans) stirred them together into a tale that once you get passed the first few pages of it, sucked you in a war between the Old Gods and the New Gods upon the American soil. It's philosopic, an ambitious tale to tell, something that in a much much much lesser degree of it, a story that i'd been trying to write myself - a realization that quickly dampen my spirit as sure as a terrible rain storm did to a cellar rat with no means of shelter whatsoever. But of course, Neil Gaiman is one of the few gifted writers that i've known nowadays and who am i to kid and pretend that i could fit in his shoes? Or any writer's shoes in that matter. It takes a talent to write, and it sucks when you wishes to write and realized that you simply had not the talent.

Anyway, what i liked the most about "American Gods" - and i had liked every little bit of it - is that almost in every transition between chapters, Neil Gaiman wrote a small intermezzo pieces that takes various culture and their respective beliefs, often sets in a time long forgotten - or in a time not very much far away from where we're at. These small intermezzo pieces were in itself, a complete short-story that should it be collected into a published copy, it would sell. These stories sometimes terrifying and disturbing (such as the tale of a twin Haitian slave separated at child), sometimes taken on a personal level (such as the tale of an Arabian NY cab driver), and sometimes taken on a mythical level (such as the tale of a northern Tribe in the year 14,000 B.C). All these tales, in my opinion point out to a same general theme that i believed was what Neil Gaiman's wishes to point in this epic, that various cultures went to America and there, their Gods, once believed and enshrined within each of their hearts, were forgotten.

I had taken a liberty to quote the late Douglas Adams from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy that "without faith, God couldn't exist". In "American Gods", these Gods, Old Gods, excluded and forgotten for the lost of faith of their believers had turn into a sentient beings, had plotted a risky and probably last effort vying for domminance in a mortal world with the New Gods - which includes a most unlikely and amusing 'Gods', such as God of Media, and God of Internet - through the eye of a seemingly mortal man, Shadow, who as oblivious to the ordeal behind the war brewing as us the audience of this epic tale. But, as Shadow progresses into the story, gaining understandings, so does the readers. It's a convenient means to tell a story, if you asked me. Had i tried to write something that generally hard to imagine, i would put one main character who doesn't know anything about this something and gradually unveiled the shroud of mystery that surrounds it. Therefore, as my character understands and probably triggered events that would ended the story, my readers would gained the same understanding as well. This was the manner or should i say, the role of Shadow in this book. Besides, Shadow is a likeable character, it was easy to like him, to share his griefs, and to celebrate his glories.

All in all, "American Gods" is an epic tale gracefully touching various almost-religious subjects, contemplating in Gods - i'm a believer, therefore, i pluralized the word "Gods" to denotes that by no means, the "Gods" in this book were the same entity with the God i believed in - and their respective waning as the faith from their followers subdued. Despite the "Gods" subject however, the book was unmistakenly fiction and it shouldn't be resulted in any feeling above the fun feeling when one's read a good book.