AMERICAN GODS, Neil Gaiman

More and more I’m becoming a fan of Neil Gaiman’s work, but in all honesty, my first attempt to read American Gods came to a crunching halt in the first chapter. I was in late high school at the time, so my literary palate still needed refining. Or I just needed to develop a deeper appreciation for Norse mythology. Whichever of these won out, I returned to and completed, with relish, this urban fantasy about ancient pantheons, sneaky mythological symbolism, and coin tricks. So many coin tricks.

Having a broader grasp of various mythologies from cultures around the world, especially that of the Norse religion, helped me progress through this book without running into prolonged periods of confusion. Some people, however, may enjoy the sheer mystery that our hero Shadow encounters on his unexpected journey. Actually, the parallels between American Gods and The Hobbit is not a little startling.

It wasn’t just knowing the mythos at play in AG that frustrated my initial reading attempt, though. Shadow, the story’s protagonist, is a very low key kind of guy. His three-year imprisonment taught him not to get anxious or hotheaded without good reason, but it also imprinted a degree of detachment to the world around him. Early on, he learns about the death of a cherished loved one, and he can’t muster up tears or, really, any outward display of emotion. The reader understands that Shadow’s reaction is understandable, but it doesn’t help with tapping into his pathos. He develops and grows a bit throughout the crazy events, and you come to appreciate his mostly chill, if baffled, attitude toward the weirdness he’s forced to deal with. It takes a while for him to get invested in the urgency of what’s unfolding, but when he finally gets there, it’s satisfying enough that you don’t entirely regret winding your way down the road to The Point. Until then, one must cope with Shadow being a passive participant for at least the first half of the book. He does have his likable qualities, thankfully. For the most part, his love for his wife drives him through the narrative, first on an emotional level, then in his transformation from passive to active hero.

Let’s get back to the gods for a second because, let’s face it, they’re the most interesting feature of the novel. The overarching conflict is between the old gods—the Norse, the Hindu, the Egyptian, and so on—and the new gods, who stem from mostly material commodities in American culture like the Internet and television media. Why America? That’s the other interesting facet. Gaiman interweaves flashbacks of America’s history when certain deified entities clashed with the fluctuating beliefs and experiences of immigrants settling in the New World. Many gods undergo their own immigration as their believers bring them along to the Americas. Some gods manage to keep a foothold, while others face extinction as, with each generation, fewer and fewer followers adhere to the old beliefs. Now, the new gods have been spurred to action for a complete takeover of the country. For readers to be interested in this conflict, the trick is to make them recognize and care about the gods involved. Gaiman mostly succeeds through Shadow, our point-of-view character, as he meets the various gods and comes to his own conclusions about whose side he prefers to take. Still, it’s nice to know who all the gods are, and while Gaiman does drop hints, which are easier to decipher with well-known gods, some of them may remain obscure. For the life of me I couldn’t figure out who Mr. Town, one of the new gods, is supposed to represent.

Shadow does come across as a self-contained character, but his function as the audience stand-in within this surreal world of gods walking on Earth, visiting obscure American sites and riding carousels, can sometimes overshadow any sense of his individual identity. At other times, his go-with-the-flow attitude reminds me of Antonius Block from The Seventh Seal. He can seem too detached or calm about the supernatural dangers pursuing him. At least he’s less cynical, more altruistic, and his signature activity is coin tricks instead of chess. Hard not to like a guy who can pull off some snazzy sleight of hand.

You may love American Gods, or you might be annoyed by the slow-paced beginning and Shadow’s passive persona, but like with Shadow, you can’t hate it. You want to see what trick its story is going to pull next.

Rating: 4/5