Exit Sandman

In The Sandman: Endless Nights, Neil Gaiman returns to tell seven more tales of the Endless. This volume was published 7 years after he wrapped up the Sandman series. I suspect that if one had been reading The Sandman when it was first being published, the return to this world would have been charming. I just read the series this last summer though, and the present volume was...OK. A few of the stories were good, but not great. A few of them were rather tired. I think this is a case of "You Can't Go Home Again, so leave well enough alone." (Hello Hollywood sequel...)

The goal of the book was to have a tale for each one of the Endless, and the tales really do feel different as the character in question changes. Delirium works the best in this way, but that is part of the problem; while the tale certainly feels like a state of Delirium, that doesn't make it the most interesting thing to read. The Despair chapter was a nice try, but in the attempt to paint 15 portraits of Despair only some of them worked. Dream had the best tale, and the Destruction tale was OK. Death and Desire both aim at the 18+ age group and are tedious. Destiny wraps it all up in a short bit which isn't exactly a story and doesn't seem to say much that isn't obvious.

All in all, skip it until a decade after you finish the 10 volume Sandman series.

[As some will know, the blog title is a reference to one of the three good Metallica songs. Why Metallica, whose members obviously have some talent, is not able to consistently produce better music is beyond me. ("No Leaf Clover" and "On the Road Again" is the answer to "What are the other two?" Emma and I have tried to rank those three songs; her ranking is consistent, mine varies by mood.)