In the case of Neil Gaiman and Lorenzo Mattotti’s Hansel & Gretel, the pictures came first. They were created in 2007 for an exhibition to celebrate the opening of the Metropolitan Opera’s staging of the opera of the same name. Later, Gaiman was shown Mattotti’s stark, black ink art, and asked to retell the story…. Read more »
Posts Categorized: First Lines
First Lines: Good Omens
The upcoming television series of Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman’s Good Omens caused a lot of excitement on Twitter, which in turn caused me to re-read the book. The plot is about a demon having misplaced the Antichrist, who is now needed on account of Armageddon being scheduled for next Saturday, just after tea. The… Read more »
First Lines: The Great John Green Re-Read Project 2018, Part 2
As I noted in part one of this series, in the last couple of years a lot of things have changed for me. And with that, the way I looked at John Green’s first three novels changed as well. Which makes sense, as they’re all boy-meets-girl-and-dealing-with-all-that-while-dealing-with-life-as-well-is-complicated stories, and I was not in that place anymore…. Read more »
First Lines: Lincoln in the Bardo
Where Ibid: A Life did not quite convince me with the execution of the story, it did prepare for what turned out to be one of the more interesting books I’ve read this year: George Saunders’s Lincoln in the Bardo. It is 1862, and Willie Lincoln has died. His grief-stricken father, the president, returns to… Read more »
First Lines: Funny Fantasy/Science Fiction/Horror
Where Alex Shvartsman’s Unidentified Funny Objects collections (mostly) contain all new funny fiction, his series of Funny Fantasy / Science Fiction / Horror anthologies contain reprints of humorous genre fiction. Now, of course, the boundaries between these genres is vague at best. And with the recurrence of several authors across all three volumes, read in… Read more »