1,042 Books
See allAn gripping journey into a universe that looks like ours, but not quite. Weird, scary, absorbing and inventive, Gaiman explores a darker landscape than Stephen King, without as much gore as Clive Barker, and with the kind of creepy discomfort that characterises Michael Marshall's novels (as well as John Connolly's earlier ones). I found this delivered on the promise of the Sandman graphic novels Gaiman wrote, but I have not enjoyed his other novels nearly as much.
Cleverly reasoned working out of a murder from a coroner's inquest testimony alone. It is brief, and benefits from its brevity, as it's hardly gripping fare reading testimony from the residents of the house in which the murder takes place. But there are sly injections of insight into the characters, and although there are one or two less than politically correct issues with the way the testimony is conveyed, it is from 1932, so some allowance must be made. Philip MacDonald is a neglected writer, and this is odd, as the books of his I've read have been very satisfying.