The Sandman that is a short story collection version! I'm certainly not one opposed to short story collections. But it seems this may have existed because they wanted to draw Arabia or the Orpheus myth. (Though I loved seeing gigantic Hades & Persephone.) It's the Sandman that is the "collected shorts in the middle of the series" so I don't think it would ever be the favorite of anyone. ( )

A good mix of alternate history fantasy and myth-making here. It's interesting that Morpheus, The Sandman, is a key character in each tale, but only shows up for a small portion of each. As with all Gaiman stories, characters are key, and we get a wide variety. We also get a variety of settings and plots, showing that he is no slouch in those areas either. ( )

Took me way too long to read this, but I had a lot of inertia during the pandemic. This one is more of a collection of unrelated stories. Great stuff as is the rest of the series. ( )

Otra coleccion de historias cortas. Incluso una de las historias cortas es en si una coleccion de historias.
Como siempre ocurre con las historias cortas, algunas son mejores que otras, hay un par que me gustron mucho como la historia sobre Baghdad, o la de los lobos. Otras me dejaron un poco mas indiferente, la de orfeo no es mas que el propio mito. ( )

Looking back over this book again, I see how much fun it is and how it's where Gaiman decided to spell out just what was going to happen at the end of Sandman. At first read, it seemed a bit of a catch-all of unconnected stories, just some fun he was having with myth and history and folktale. But no, the pieces are nicely thematically linked, and cut a twisting path toward what's to come in the narrative. Nicely done!

Discovering the Gene Wolfe introduction was just icing. Or maybe it was a sign.

Do you read introductions? I do, and after having read a good many of them, I am sadly aware that most of us who write them do not know what they are supposed to accomplish, which is to enable you to start the stories without embarrassment. Like a social introduction -- some friend says, "This is Nina. She likes mint juleps and breeds ferrets," and you're off.

Now I want to use this book in class, as an introduction to and fellow traveler with the original Orpheus myth and some of the other entertaining threads. It would make the core of a GREAT unit. This is what happens when you tell English teachers, "we don't use textbooks." ( )