Urban Fantasy, Week of Oct. 16

Neil Gaiman is a man who has become the face to this genre. He has also updated and growth the genre singlehandedly. Molding it to children books, graphic novels, and adult fiction. The interest in genre has expanded the growing culture difference between countries. He expanded his stories that happen in the Americas and in Africa. Having characters from diverse places and backgrounds.

I read American Gods for this week. American Gods is a book that is purely American to a point that American writers can’t (or have not) reached. Many writers stick to writing about where they are from even if they make the choice to write about a far off place, they kept the little regional quirks that they don’t realize are regional.

The production of American Gods was a road trip across the United States every area in the book including the roads and side attractions are based on the true nature of the micro-culture in a state. How the micro-cultures interact is also a thing that he explores as Shadow travels. It hardly ever seems like an Englishman writing.

A factor with this may be that he is balancing a lot of cultural backgrounds. European Pagan, Ancient Egyptian, and Smaller tribal gods to name a few. Comparing the worship of the gods and the cultures that they bring with them with the modern swing of technology and infrastructure. This relationship has change a lot since the writing of this novel but, the concept is still interesting.