American GodsA Novel

Fallen gods grapple with their has-been status in Gaiman's loving picaresque
Fans of Neil Gaiman's work are already familiar with the Sandman author's penchant for pitting the ancient and the modern against each other, so it's no surprise the theme plays a central role in this sprawling but satisfying novel. In Gaiman's telling, the U.S. is crawling with ancient gods, brought over by immigrants and then discarded as polytheistic beliefs and old-world legends fell by the wayside. It's hard times for these discarded figureheads, who eke out a living doing odd jobs, sustained by the vague memories of their erstwhile worshippers, and they're about to get worse, as a new set of gods — pimply-faced teenagers with domain over the internet and credit cards — start trying to clean the old ones out of their territory.

Part of the fun of reading American Gods is trying to guess the characters' identities based on incidental clues: the one-eyed man who calls himself Wednesday, or the central figure, a bereaved ex-con known only as Shadow. (Sandman readers have a leg up here, as they'll remember Gaiman' fondness for obscurities like the Egyptian cat-god Bast.) The plot, such as it is, is largely episodic, following Shadow and Wednesday's attempt to drum up recruits for the coming war between gods, but their journey allows Gaiman to show off his flair for capturing the mystery of forgotten pockets of Americana like Wisconsin's House on the Rock, a massive trove of kitschy collections centered around the world's largest carousel. With an immigrant's critical eye and unabashed love, Gaiman implicitly argues that such monuments are our modern-day churches, temples to devotion and excess — which, really, is no worse than worshipping a man who throws lightning from clouds.