“Fiddle-de-dee’s not English.”

The Sandman Volume 9: The Kindly Ones by Neil Gaiman
Illustrated by Marc Hempel, Richard Case, D’Israeli, Teddy Kristiansen, Glyn Dillon, Charles Vess, Dean Ormston and Kevin Nowlan
Vertigo (1996)
352 pages

Despite having another two volumes to the Sandman series after The Kindly Ones, this volume is definitely the climax of the series, where Gaiman attempts (quite successfully, I must say) to tie up the loose ends from all the previous storylines.

Now, when you have eight volumes and numerous subplots with various loose ends to tie, you have a lot of stories and a lot of characters — the thickness of this volume testifies to that — and I was struggling to remember what happened earlier, especially in The Doll’s House and Seasons of Mist. I read those first volumes very long ago, it seems. Rose’s story, especially, has grown really vague to my mind. But I did love the story that one of the old women told her (about a man who promised to marry a woman but didn’t), and the illustrations done for the story.

If there’s one thing about this collection that irritates me, it’s how it tries to make a reference to almost everyone and everything the series had touched before, so it gets a little long-winded at points. And this volume wouldn’t be able to stand alone, and won’t make much sense if read out of order. Start from the beginning and don’t skip volumes (like I did!).

I didn’t quite like the artwork when I first started, but I guess it grew on me.

This book also made me cheer so hard for Matthew the crow. I had always liked him, but here he’s just wonderful.

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The Wake by Neil Gaiman
Illustrated by Michael Zulli, Jon J Muth and Charles Vess
Vertigo (1997)
192 pages

Here is your epilogue, the ending of the series. This was sombre and a little bit slow, as it tries to wrap up whatever’s left to wrap up. We get to see a whole lot of people in the Dreaming this time, characters ordinary and curious, talking about their experiences with Dream and dreams and the Dreaming. This volume also made me love Matthew even more. There are a lot of things covered here — from loyalty to mortality and the choices that some of the characters make, and mourning and loving and moving on.

I have problems remembering what happened before, and that kind of brought down my enjoyment of this volume. (What was the deal Will Shakespeare made with Morpheus? I forget. Also, this probably means I will have to check out The Tempest — thanks to his story here and partly to Dan Simmon’s Ilium.)

The second-to-last story in the volume was the one I liked most. The illustration was done in a style that I really liked, almost like Chinese ink-drawings; befitting to the story being told, I guess.

This is a great end to a wonderful series. I’m always a bit sad when I get to the ending of a series, but then again, the best thing about getting to the end is being able to look back to the beginning and think, Oh, so that was where all that was heading, and think how very well everything was done.

The Sandman Volume 7: Brief Lives by Neil Gaiman
Illustrated by Jill Thompson and Vince Locke
Vertigo (1995)
110 pages

I read this after skipping Volume 6: Fables and Reflections, at the time the only volume my sister didn’t own. I don’t know if that detracted from the experience of reading this volume — we already have Fables and Reflections now and I still haven’t read it.

I think it’s the best story arc of the Sandman collections I’ve read (I only have Fables and Reflections and Endless Nights left). It deals mainly with the Endless, Dream’s family, as he and his sister Delirium search for their brother Destruction.

What I liked: the stories, of course. I think Gaiman is sometimes better with short, poignant stories than longer novels. I also liked the art from this volume more than some of the others. I loved Delirium. Now I understand why the LJ population of Gaiman’s fans adore Delirium. (Death remains my favourite Endless, if only because she chucked that piece of bread at Dream’s head in the first volume.) And of course there’s the king of dreams himself — I still like Dream, despite all his emo-ness (and the context escaped me, sadly, since I skipped the previous volume, but then again, he’s always been a rather melancholy character), and he’s surprisingly predictable in how he gets frustrated with his little sister.

I’m not sure what I don’t like — I did wish that everyone didn’t have to feel the need to point out that Dream has changed — the story carries that through well enough without this being pointed out. Otherwise this volume pretty much was perfect to me.

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The Sandman Volume 8: Worlds’ End by Neil Gaiman
Illustrated by Michael Allred, Gary Amaro, Mark Buckingham, Dick Giordano, Tony Harris, Steve Leialoha, Vince Locke, Shea Anton Pensa, Alec Stevens, Bryan Talbot, John Watkiss and Michael Zulli
Vertigo (1995)
168 pages

This volume had stories within stories within stories. A “reality storm” blows in, leaving a bunch of travellers from different times and places stranded at an inn called Worlds’ End. To pass the time, they tell stories. The stories are mostly stand-alone, with characters who had appeared before in the series making an appearance, and the Endless appearing from time to time in them, but not being central to the story. I sort of missed having Morpheus around.

I liked some stories better than the others — Jim’s story, Hob’s Leviathan, was the one I liked best, about a boy going to sea and seeing a sea-monster, and I also liked the style the artist used. I also liked The Golden Boy, the story about the boy president. I liked the art in the first story, Tale of Two Cities. It makes the story even more creepy.

The readers are made aware that something momentous is going on as the focus shifts between the stories and the inn. The ending made me go asdk;kl (again — I’m doing that too often lately), wondering what had happened outside the inn.

Not one of my favourite volumes, but it certainly has some very interesting stories.

Uh, I’m not sure why this is even in this list. I liked this volume, but I came away feeling rather confused about the whole thing. Concentrating too long on one storyline made my attention wander, I suppose.

It’s a story about a lot of things, but I guess it’s mostly about finding who you are. The real world of a young woman and her fantasy world as a child collide, and a lot of pretty damn strange things happen.

I will admit that I have no real desire to reread this volume at this point. My sister is an avid Gaiman fan, and she admitted that she didn’t quite enjoy A Game of You compared to the earlier volumes.

I still say it was a great read, though.