Saturday, February 7, 2015

The Ocean at the End of the Lane: a mini review


Well, normally I would be posting several games from my backlog that I tried out and giving them mini reviews.  While I have a couple ready for that, I don’t feel I have enough to warrant a posting.  Why haven’t I been playing hard for this?  Well, two reasons.  The first is that I cannot stop playing The Binding of Isaac:  Rebirth.  It is one seriously addicting game.  The second was I took time out to read a book by one of my favorite authors Neil Gaiman.  And let me tell you, that was a delight well beloved.

I follow him on Twitter, and saw that he had a new book coming out.  I wanted to read it, but since I couldn’t, I looked for one of his I hadn’t read yet.  And that book I chose was The Ocean at the End of the Lane.

It is, at first glance, a tale of a middle aged man coming back to his hometown for a funeral and his reminiscing of his (now destroyed) childhood home and his time with his first real friend, a slightly older girl named Lettie Hempstock.  He quickly finds out that Letting and her family (her mother and grandmother) are much more than they appear, and what the cost of him knowing them is.  This tale runs the gamut from childhood fears to all-encompassing wonder to adult guilt.  And it is written in Gaiman’s smooth flowing prose that makes you thirsty for more of his writing.  I hungrily read this 250 page book in but a few hours, but the pleasure it gave me still persists nearly a week on.  I HIGHLY recommend reading his works.  They at times may not seem as fleshed out as you think they should be, but soon he reveals the depth of his words in the entire flow he presents.   In fact, I was so enamored with this book, that I immediately reread Coraline, another great work from him.

So now, with a clearer head, I am ready to tackle my other project.  Already I have started Deadpool and 3d Dot Game Heroes, and should be back up to snuff-although I have realized a small flaw in my plan.  Without going into specifics at this time, I WILL say it involves RPGs…

No comments:

Post a Comment