From the Bookshelf of Topeka & Shawnee Co. Public Library…

The Ocean at the End of the Lane

Neil Gaiman

Start date: December 5, 2013

Finish date: December 5, 2013

Why we're reading this: I want to live in the world's Neil Gaiman creates. Fantastic book!!!…more
[close] I want to live in the world's Neil Gaiman creates. Fantastic book!!!

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Dec 28, 2015 Kara rated it it was amazing

Oh my gursh.
Before I start I am going to confess I haven't read a dug gum book by Neil Gaiman before this book. I was looking for a book of his and found this on the library shelves. Oh my.
We follow the story of an unnamed man who chooses to visit the house of an old friend some decades later. Then he tells us about the girl who lived there and the adventures he had with her.
Sounds simple enough, sometimes simple makes the best stories. This story is simple in it's complexity. We do not expect t Oh my gursh.
Before I start I am going to confess I haven't read a dug gum book by Neil Gaiman before this book. I was looking for a book of his and found this on the library shelves. Oh my.
We follow the story of an unnamed man who chooses to visit the house of an old friend some decades later. Then he tells us about the girl who lived there and the adventures he had with her.
Sounds simple enough, sometimes simple makes the best stories. This story is simple in it's complexity. We do not expect the events that transpire. The emotions we feel. This is a book you can relate to. Expect it to take you back to your childhood days and what made them magical and terrible at the same time.
The characters are spot on. We only really connect with the unnamed protagonist as he tells the story from a child's point of view. The side characters are people we find in our everyday lives. The younger sibling, mother, father, strange neighbors you can't really explain. You feel like a child again, but this doesn't make you feel childish. You feel the things you used to and realize you were only human and young. Exploring the outside world, seeing everyday things adults do that you can't explain, and the terribleness that is the dreary everyday world.
The settle mostly takes place inside a couple houses and the world outside. It is explained through the mind of the protagonist. The outside world to a child is a magical place and we feel that magic even though it's just the outside, or a bedroom. I had to stop reading this book occasionally and remember the times in my childhood where I would explore the wooded areas behind our house. How wonderful those days were when all I had to do to entertain myself was take a walk and let my imagination fly. They were the good days.
This book is about the seen and unseen world. We don't know who the protagonist's mysterious neighbors are, but we can imagine them. Perhaps as we age we fail to look at the world the way it's meant to be seen as through the eyes of a child.
This book was a little rough to start, but picks up pace quickly. It is very short. I finished it in only a few hours but the effects afterwards has me still seeing stars. This is a great book. Almost everyone who picks it up will enjoy it. I would say it's appropriate for younger teenagers to any and all adults. It has a few scenes in it that make it child inappropriate. ...more

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Mar 04, 2015 Julie rated it liked it

I listened to the author narrating the audio version. The story itself is very different from the type of thing I usually read or like. That being said, there are great insights and quotes from this book about being human with all our faults, fears, desires, etc.

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Dec 20, 2020 Carol rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I listened to the audiobook on this one. It was read by the author which is always a treat. :)

This is an odd, somewhat mystical and strange yet captivating book. I was intrigued all the way through but a little disappointed in the end, because it was so nebulus. The beginning of the book ripped my heart out and I cried like a baby, so beware of that if you intend to pick it up. The middle was an adventure filled with great imagery and suspense. I kept wanting to talk to the main character with ...more

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