kami said:
As for 'Sandman', I read the first graphic novel and I tried to like it but the art just ruined the experience for me to the point where I got a migraine. Do you know if the series get a new artist later on?
Also, have you read 'Stardust'? As I was thinking about picking it up and was wondering what it was like?
You should probably also try out China Mieville if Neil Gaiman interests you - though Mieville has less urbane wit than Gaiman at the expense of being darker and more political.
1) Sandman is illustrated by a ton of different people, each with their own art style/quality. Some are rather ugly, others are absolutely gorgeous, and some are really bizarre yet stylistic. If you ask me, book 1 and book 7(?) (Brief Lives) are the weakest in this regard, but book 10 is easily the best, with the Despair chapter standing out with its weird abstract fleshiness, as well as Desire's gorgeous autumn tone. Actually, if you ask me, the Sandman stories are best read for their individual and self-contained chapters, Gaiman is an excellent short story writer as obvious from Smoke and Mirrors (I have yet to read Fragile Things).
2) Stardust is one of his weaker and more trite novels, but it's still a fun read with its neat fairy-taleness and Victorian vibe.
3) China Mieville is a very different beast compared to Neil Gaiman, their only similarities are a lack of constraints to an imagination which would, in more Puritan times, be tied to a stick and set on fire. I would especially recommend The Scar, it cleverly misdirects the purposes and motives of its characters regularly, to the point where much simpler fantasy conventions break down under such a Machievellian assault. Unlike Gaiman's stuff, which tends to have more transparent themes to them (note this sentence is completely and utterly wrong when applied to Gaiman's American Gods).
