Keely's review
Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman (Goodreads author!)
Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant! Really enjoyed the humor, cleverness, and atmosphere of this book.
Anansi Boys, as you might guess from the title, does for West African myths what American Gods does for Norse mythology - brings it into a modern context and makes the old gods of yore seem human and likable, if rather flawed and selfish. Anansi Boys is not, as is commonly believed the sequel to American Gods but because the book centers on a character that appears in that earlier book, they are set in the same universe. That is, however, where the similarities end. They are very different books written from very different perspectives about the inherent truths that make up the world. American Gods was, in my opinion, the more complex, intricate, and engrossing of the two novels. With American Gods you simply never knew what was going to happen next. Anansi Boys is written slightly more predictably, but is much less dark, slightly more...more
Anansi Boys, as you might guess from the title, does for West African myths what American Gods does for Norse mythology - brings it into a modern context and makes the old gods of yore seem human and likable, if rather flawed and selfish. Anansi Boys is not, as is commonly believed the sequel to American Gods but because the book centers on a character that appears in that earlier book, they are set in the same universe. That is, however, where the similarities end. They are very different books written from very different perspectives about the inherent truths that make up the world. American Gods was, in my opinion, the more complex, intricate, and engrossing of the two novels. With American Gods you simply never knew what was going to happen next. Anansi Boys is written slightly more predictably, but is much less dark, slightly more...more
