The Pope
This is my body, he said, two thousand years ago. This is my blood.
It was the only religion that delivered exactly what it promised: life eternal for its adherents.
There are some of us alive today who remember him. And some of us claim that he was a messiah, and some think that he was just a man with very special powers. But that misses the point. Whatever he was, he changed the world.
– Neil Gaiman, from Fifteen Painted Cards From a Vampire Tarot
I like Neil Gaiman, for the most part. I especially like some of his children’s books, like Coraline, The Graveyard Book, and The Wolves in the Walls, but also for books like The Anansi Boys. I find it interesting that Gaiman, who is a fairly outspoken atheist, has such a fascination with gods and the supernatural—with myth, actually. It seems that he is often unable to tell a story without it. He appears to understand the great power of myth—but perhaps fails to understand that sometimes it’s bigger than he is.
“American Gods” is his breakout best, in my opinion, one which he has never been able to quite match since.