Neil Gaiman: Anansi Boys and Mirrormask

It is an indication of Neil Gaiman's massive popularity — he garnered a loyal following way beyond comic fandom with his DC Vertigo series The Sandman — that the English-born, American-based author's second adult novel proper, Anansi Boys, is presented more like a DVD than a book. It comes complete with "exclusive extra material" in the shape of a deleted chapter, reading-group discussion questions and more.

Anansi Boys springs out of one of the minor characters from Gaiman's first adult novel, the impressive American Gods. African spider-god Anansi is a trickster in the mould of Coyote and Loki and it is his slightly exaggerated death that sets the plot in motion.

But the story mostly centres around Anansi's apparently human son, the puntastically named Fat Charlie Nancy, who not only discovers that his recently deceased father was a minor deity but also that he has a long-lost brother, Spider.

Unlike Fat Charlie, Spider has inherited their father's supernatural gifts along with his irresistible charisma and womanising ways. Spider soon takes over Fat Charlie's life, stealing his flat, job and fiancee.

Although it does contain a few grisly moments, Anansi Boys is a more light-hearted, gentler read than American Gods and, with its focus on just the one god as such, its scope is more intimate than epic.

Anansi Boys also marks Gaiman's return to the humorous side he first displayed in his 1990 prose debut, Good Omens, which he co-wrote with Discworld author Terry Pratchett, although this time around his references are more Ealing comedy than Monty Python.

However, Gaiman struggles to maintain the balance between the story's fantastical and humorous elements and his conclusion is a little too neat. At times, I longed for a story with a bit more teeth but Anansi Boys is still an absorbing read.

MirrorMask, meanwhile, adapts Gaiman's feature-film debut of the same name and it is published in the same oversized format as the author's highly successful children's picture books, The Wolves in the Walls and The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish.

Accompanying Gaiman's whimsical prose are lavish illustrations by Gaiman's frequent collaborator and MirrorMask film director, Dave McKean. MirrorMask is less like a traditional comic book than its two predecessors — the words and pictures are mostly presented separately but — unlike The Time Traveller's Wife author Audrey Niffenegger, who sniffily proclaimed that her recent, disappointing Three Incestuous Sisters was a "visual novel", not a graphic novel — Gaiman and McKean are proud of their pulp roots.

As for MirrorMask's story, it closely resembles Gaiman's excellent children's novel, Coraline,  which he will also soon make into a film; both revolve around a young heroine who ventures into a spooky otherworld, which is similar but at the same time eerily different to our own.

MirrorMask the film has yet to be scheduled for release in New Zealand so Gaiman aficionados will have to be content with this superb adaptation. And reading the book will not spoil the film, because the main joy with consummate storytellers such as Gaiman and McKean lies not in which story they tell but in how they tell it.


* Anansi Boys, Headline, $37
* Mirrormask, Bloomsbury, $33
* Stephen Jewell is an Auckland journalist