Void
Experiencer
- 9,409
- 11,072
I will probably get some heat for this, but this book bored me to tears. Perhaps I am just not the target audience for it, but I wanted it to be done so badly at times. Some of the interludes, in particular, I just wanted to end. I get that they were there to show how some of the gods made it to America, and some of them were halfway decent. Like, I didn't mind the one with the chick that put the milk out every night for the piskies (sp) and when the one mythical creature showed up he basically took her life force or whatever. But the one with the twin brother and sister brought over as slaves, and the girl taught some half-white girl about magic...bleh, that one made me shake my head and wonder wtf I was supposed to get out of that.
The main story itself was ok, but it didn't excite me or make me want to keep reading to find out what was going to happen. The "big reveal" didn't shock me or surprise me. Loki surprised me...a little...but at that point I wasn't super-startled or anything and it didn't really matter to me. Odin's rebirth was completely expected, Shadow's part in things no big deal, the "double cross" I truly didn't care about. The tacked on story of the missing kids could have been removed completely and it would have made zero impact on me, or the rest of the plot.
It just seemed like the entire book was an exercise in trying to cram as much mystery and symbolism and literary "stuff" into one book, with little regard for actually being interesting. It certainly wasn't the worst book I've ever read, but I have a friend that typically reads the same books I do, and when all was said and done I had to tell him that he probably shouldn't bother reading it. I got no real excitement or enjoyment out of reading it, so clearly it wasn't the book for me. I liked Old Man's War *significantly* better, because the characters were interesting, the plot engaged you early on, and there was a sense that I wanted to keep reading to find out what happened. American Gods never truly interested me, and things just *were* with very little explanation. His wife is a zombie, apparently because he gave her the coin that he was mistakenly given. While I don't need things spelled out in detail, if the coin was ever truly explained other than just that it *was*, then I guess I missed it. What would the coin have accomplished if it hadn't been given to Shadow? Would I have even cared if I knew that answer? Probably not, to be honest.
I could name several dozen things that just did nothing for me, or seemed to merely be thrown into the story so he could say, "Look, another god living in a decidedly un-godlike manner!" The cat-god-chick at the funeral parlor. The three sisters, one of which gave him the moon coin/liberty head. It seemed like all of that should have culminated in something majorly important, but it didn't. The god that he could never remember the name of. Hell, the hitchhiker girl that ends up being his neighbor's sister, where did that take me story-wise? I won't list everything because I'd be here a long time, but you get the point. So many things that seemed like they should be important in some way, but really didn't matter one shit-pot full. You could have distilled the actual important plot elements down into maybe 50 pages max, and conveyed much the same story in my opinion, because all the extra stuff really didn't matter one bit. I get that it was about the journey, but I never got any sense of that journey. His wife told Shadow he was "empty" and I sensed that from the emptiness of his existence, and he finally found "purpose" hanging on the tree, but I quite literally didn't give a fuck by then. I was bored and just wanted it over with. I felt like I was hanging from the tree through the entire book, and I would have gladly chosen emptiness as well.
I realize that every single one of the things I have a problem with might simply be me not "getting it," but if I have to work that hard to understand a book, I'd rather not read it. Maybe I'm dumb, or shallow, or too worried about instant gratification. But for being such a hugely acclaimed novel, in a genre that I like, and somewhat related to mythology (which I've always loved), I was extremely disappointed.
Commence the lynching (pun intended)!
The main story itself was ok, but it didn't excite me or make me want to keep reading to find out what was going to happen. The "big reveal" didn't shock me or surprise me. Loki surprised me...a little...but at that point I wasn't super-startled or anything and it didn't really matter to me. Odin's rebirth was completely expected, Shadow's part in things no big deal, the "double cross" I truly didn't care about. The tacked on story of the missing kids could have been removed completely and it would have made zero impact on me, or the rest of the plot.
It just seemed like the entire book was an exercise in trying to cram as much mystery and symbolism and literary "stuff" into one book, with little regard for actually being interesting. It certainly wasn't the worst book I've ever read, but I have a friend that typically reads the same books I do, and when all was said and done I had to tell him that he probably shouldn't bother reading it. I got no real excitement or enjoyment out of reading it, so clearly it wasn't the book for me. I liked Old Man's War *significantly* better, because the characters were interesting, the plot engaged you early on, and there was a sense that I wanted to keep reading to find out what happened. American Gods never truly interested me, and things just *were* with very little explanation. His wife is a zombie, apparently because he gave her the coin that he was mistakenly given. While I don't need things spelled out in detail, if the coin was ever truly explained other than just that it *was*, then I guess I missed it. What would the coin have accomplished if it hadn't been given to Shadow? Would I have even cared if I knew that answer? Probably not, to be honest.
I could name several dozen things that just did nothing for me, or seemed to merely be thrown into the story so he could say, "Look, another god living in a decidedly un-godlike manner!" The cat-god-chick at the funeral parlor. The three sisters, one of which gave him the moon coin/liberty head. It seemed like all of that should have culminated in something majorly important, but it didn't. The god that he could never remember the name of. Hell, the hitchhiker girl that ends up being his neighbor's sister, where did that take me story-wise? I won't list everything because I'd be here a long time, but you get the point. So many things that seemed like they should be important in some way, but really didn't matter one shit-pot full. You could have distilled the actual important plot elements down into maybe 50 pages max, and conveyed much the same story in my opinion, because all the extra stuff really didn't matter one bit. I get that it was about the journey, but I never got any sense of that journey. His wife told Shadow he was "empty" and I sensed that from the emptiness of his existence, and he finally found "purpose" hanging on the tree, but I quite literally didn't give a fuck by then. I was bored and just wanted it over with. I felt like I was hanging from the tree through the entire book, and I would have gladly chosen emptiness as well.
I realize that every single one of the things I have a problem with might simply be me not "getting it," but if I have to work that hard to understand a book, I'd rather not read it. Maybe I'm dumb, or shallow, or too worried about instant gratification. But for being such a hugely acclaimed novel, in a genre that I like, and somewhat related to mythology (which I've always loved), I was extremely disappointed.
Commence the lynching (pun intended)!
