Anansi Boys in Crazy Challenge Connection

Apr 09, 2017 Jamie (TheRebelliousReader) rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, from-my-shelf, 4-and-a-half-stars, adult, 2017

4 stars. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and though it's nowhere near as good as American Gods it's still worth the read.

This works on it's own. If you go in expecting a sequel or companion to AG you'll be disappointed because this book is not a sequel and it's not even connected to it. Honestly the only thing that ties the two together is that Anansi is a character in both and that's it. I enjoyed this purely as it's own thing.

This book was a lot of fun. I enjoyed the story, the adventure and t ...more

2 likes · Like · see review

Feb 25, 2021 Amy rated it it was amazing

simply loved this book.
Folklore, dark humor, fantasy. Classic Gaiman

2 likes · Like · see review

Oct 12, 2012 Chaitra rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: british-literature, retellings-spinoffs-adaptations, urban-fantasy, humor, mythology, fantasy

Beware, here there be spiders. No way around it. Being an arachnophobe, I had to grit my teeth and stay with it if I needed to finish this for my Neil Gaiman reading project. It was hard, because I was falling down laughing while I was doing said gritting. Anansi Boys, is Neil Gaiman doing sibling rivalry, in typical Neil Gaiman fashion, except a lot funnier and more charming than his other books.

Anansi, we've met before. He's in American Gods, mostly charming and slightly creepy in a couple of Beware, here there be spiders. No way around it. Being an arachnophobe, I had to grit my teeth and stay with it if I needed to finish this for my Neil Gaiman reading project. It was hard, because I was falling down laughing while I was doing said gritting. Anansi Boys, is Neil Gaiman doing sibling rivalry, in typical Neil Gaiman fashion, except a lot funnier and more charming than his other books.

Anansi, we've met before. He's in American Gods, mostly charming and slightly creepy in a couple of scenes when he's also a spider. Here, he's dead. And in an annoying fashion too, in the middle of a song in a karaoke bar, clutching on to a tourist's bra. Or so his son Fat Charlie thinks. Fat Charlie is not fat. He used to be, and his father gave him the name, and then it stuck. Fat Charlie also has no idea that his father was a god, nor that he's not his father's only son. He apparently is his more godly brother called Spider, and to invite him home, Fat Charlie needs to talk to a spider. He does. Like a fool. Mayhem ensues.

What pulled me into the story right away was Fat Charlie. Others have called him a flat character only getting interesting towards the end. I disagree. I fell in love with him the minute he made a touching speech to his father at the wrong funeral. It's highly entertaining to see Fat Charlie go through embarrassment after embarrassment until he grows quite tired of it and comes out on top. It's quite a simple story, of Good vs. Evil, and of someone screwing up quite badly and fixing it; this is just a very unique take on it (at least, I think it is). I like Gaiman's humor, not really prevalent in other books. His imagination is as good as ever, and so is his story telling ability.

But really, my five stars are for making a sworn arachnophobe mostly forget about the spiders in the story. At least until I have a hilarious nightmare tonight about a spider, a tiger and a flamingo in a karaoke bar...

Edit. I know Fat Charlie is West Indian and this is probably wrong on many levels, but I had the face of Jonah Hill in 21 Jump Street come up in my head every time I read the name Fat Charlie. Annoying to say the least!

...more

1 like · Like · see review