THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE BY NEIL GAIMAN
Genre: Fantasy, Horror
“I lived in books more than I lived anywhere else.”
-Neil Gaiman, The Ocean at the End of the Lane
Synopsis:
Sussex, England. A middle-aged man returns to his childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the end of the road, where, when he was seven, he encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn’t thought of Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond that she’d claimed was an ocean) behind the ramshackle old farmhouse, the unremembered past comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too frightening, too dangerous to have happened to anyone, let alone a small boy.
Forty years earlier, a man committed suicide in a stolen car at this farm at the end of the road. Like a fuse on a firework, his death lit a touchpaper and resonated in unimaginable ways. The darkness was unleashed, something scary and thoroughly incomprehensible to a little boy. And Lettie—magical, comforting, wise beyond her years—promised to protect him, no matter what.
A groundbreaking work from a master, The Ocean at the End of the Lane is told with a rare understanding of all that makes us human, and shows the power of stories to reveal and shelter us from the darkness inside and out. It is a stirring, terrifying, and elegiac fable as delicate as a butterfly’s wing and as menacing as a knife in the dark.[Goodreads]
I am going to keep this review short and sweet. The book is very short and I feel like if you read too much into it and look at reviews it will ruin the magic that revolves around this story.
It is a modern fairy tale story that brings about a feeling of nostalgia and childhood. The storytelling is absolutely beautiful and full of fantastic imagery and reminded me of those time in my childhood when everything seemed possible. The main character loves reading and all the worlds and possibilities that they present and really spoke to me and I could relate to him in so many ways. It was dark,eerie and ultimately a haunting novel that produced that fear that we are all so familiar with from our youth. The imagination and mind can poses and create beautiful and wonderful things and Neil Gaiman definitely conveys this throughout the pages of this fantastic story.
There is such truth, sadness and beauty conveyed in a dreamlike state that had a huge impact on me. This is a book that I believe everyone can find a connection to and really speaks to everyones inner child. I believe this will be a book that I will be convincing everyone I know to read!
23 comments
I loved this book! Your review says it perfectly.
Thank you ! 🙂
I loved this book so much! Neil Gaiman is truly great.
Great review! I loved this book 🙂
Great review! This is on my queue to review as well and it seems we felt quite similarly about it
The sad part scares me, but this book looks so good and perfect for Halloween! 🙂 Nice review.
It is not a crying your eyes out sad more of just a slight feeling of sadness.
Oh good. Thanks for telling me. 🙂
Dropping by to let you know that I’ve nominated you for a Liebster Award, because I love your blog and I think you deserve ALL THE ATTENTION! 🙂 Hope you have a good day!
http://radiantreads.wordpress.com/2014/10/27/liebster-award-nomination-aka-whaaaaat-%F0%9F%98/
Wonderful review! I’ve never read a Neil Gaiman book I didn’t like, but this, Stardust, and American Gods are my favorites 🙂
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