Neil Gaiman's second short-fiction collection. My favorite story in this one is probably the quite brilliant pastiche A Study in Emerald (which I had actually read elsewhere before), but there's a lot of interesting (and creepy) stuff in it. Gaiman is a fascinatingly versatile writer and probably at his very best at these short stories and texts.

From the back cover:

"Let me tell you a story. No, wait, one's not enough.
I'll begin again...

Let me tell you stories of the months of the year, of ghosts and heartbreak, of dread and desire. Let me tell you of after-hours drinking and unanswered phones, of good deeds and bad days, of breaking down and making up, of dead men walking and missing fathers, of little French ladies in Miami, of trusting wolves and how to talk to girls.

There are stories within stories, whispered in ears in the quiet of the night, shouted above the roar of the day, and played out between lovers and enemies, strangers and friends. But all, all are fragile things made up using just 26 letters arranged and rearranged again and again to form tales and imaginings which, if you let them, will dazzle your senses, haunt your imagination and move you to the very depths of your soul."

I'm afraid I accidentally spilled some coffee on this book (doesn't affect readability). Since I also actually want a smaller-sized edition for my private bookshelf, I'm offering this as a bookray book on the Finnish-Suomi forum - particularly since several of my country(wo)men BCers seem to have Fragile Things on their wish lists. PM me if interested!

Suomalaisille bookcrossaajille tiedoksi: tämä on pokkari mutta normaalia isompikokoinen painos eli juuri ja juuri alle 3 cm paksu, mutta painaa selvästi yli puoli kiloa ainakin keittiövaakani mukaan. Kuriirikyyditys voi siis olla toivottavin.

Bookray participants so far:

1. Kemppu, Tampere
2. lukutuoli, Tampere
3. Mergylien, Kokkola
4. lunatum, Oulu/Savukoski
5. chirel and Sammaltassu, Tampere

(Bookray finished already.)

The participants have about a month to read the book and a couple of weeks to arrange a courier ride between towns. Happy reading!

Got the book at the Finnish bookcrossers' summer meeting in Tampere. I'm a big fan of Neil Gaiman and I haven't read this yet. So, thank you!

I have said several times before that I'm not particularly into short stories. They just don't seem to work for me. However, along with Edgar Allan Poe's, Neil Gaiman's stories are an exception.
In my opinion, this collection of Gaiman's short fiction wasn't as good as the previous one, Smoke and Mirrors, but it was still good. My absolute favourite story here was October in the Chair. Other favourites were Instructions, Harlequin Valentine, which I have read as a comic book too, How to Talk to Girls at Parties and Sunbird. I also think that Other People was very clever despite its horribleness.
Bookcrosser harmaja said in the journal entry of my copy of Smoke and Mirrors that Neil Gaiman's stories are all about stories. Very true in the case of this book, too. There are several allusions to various other stories and books, stories within stories, stories that tell about telling stories etc. in Neil Gaiman's works.


I'll give the book to lukutuoli as soon as possible.

As soon as possible...yeah...well, it''s summer. I''ll take the book to the picnic meeting of Tampere tomorrow, where lukutuoli finally gets it (I hope). I''m sorry for the delay.

We had a nice and sunny picnic with local bookcrossers in Sorsapuisto this evening, and I got this book from Kemppu. I'm just reading Neverwhere by the same author, Fragile Things will be the next book of mine to be read. Thank you for sharing, Niora!

EDIT 14.08.2007
For some reason I had plenty of difficulties to follow the stories and concentrate on them. I didn't like the feeling, that reading was like hard work, so I skipped a few stories. Perhaps it just was the wrong place and wrong time for this book ?! The best part of the book, this time, was the good-looking portrait by Gaiman in the front page ;)
I don't know anyone travelling to Kokkola, so I'll post the book to Mergylien tomorrow.

I got "Fragile Things" last friday. I start reading it as soon as I can.

Finally I managed to finish the Fragile Things. Some stories were good and some not so good. Especially I like those "poem" stories.

I send the book to Lunatum last friday...

I am really sorry I haven't made a journal entry of this book. All the time I've been thinking that I've already made it. I haven't had time to read this one, but now I do have. If Niora gives me extra time... Sorry again.

Finally I finished this book. Some short stories were good, but others I didn't like at all.

I'll send this book to next reader probably next week.

Thank you lunatum. We came home two days ago and I didn't have time to pick up tthe package before. I guess Sammaltassu will read the book first since I just started another book.

I assume that we can do whatever we like with the book if there's no new participants.

I read most stories of the collection ages ago, but stopped at the novella at the end, 'The Monarch of the Glen'. I guess I was getting a bit tired of Gaiman at that point, and wanted to save the longer story for later. Well, the time was now, and with the novella, I finally finished the whole book.

Looking through the entries above, I see I'm not the only one who felt that this didn't quite rise to the level of Smoke and Mirrors. I think Fragile Things would be better if many of the less remarkable stories were left out entirely. None of the stories are really bad, mind you (IMHO), but a lot of them are mediocre, or, at best, 'nice'. If some of these were removed, the gems would be more prominent, and the quality of the collection as a whole would be elevated.

The aforementioned gems include, in my opinion, the brilliant pastiche 'A Study in Emerald' (Gaiman excels at this kind of intertextual stuff), 'Forbidden Brides of the Faceless Slaves in the Secret House of the Night of Dread Desire' (more intertextuality), 'Keepsakes and Treasures' (disgusting in a good way) and 'Sunbird' (a weird mixture that defies comparison to other stories). There are also some clever, haunting and horrid little tales.

I was somewhat unimpressed with 'The Monarch of the Glen', even though it had its moments. It feels like an unnecessary addition to American Gods, something that uses the same main character because he's convenient, not because there's something more to tell about him.

So, this book goes back to waiting for Chirel to have time for it. We'll see where it will go after that.

I'm finally actually reading the book!

Sorry to have kept it so long, lucky thing (and propably the reason for stalling the book) is that I'm the last in this ring.

I'm not sure what I think of this book. I have a feeling I didn't much like it. There were only two or three stories that I really liked, others were not my style or were dissapointing in some other way - mainly because Gaiman uses open ending so much and I like my closures. I don't have much to say about the poems, I haven't learned to read poetry.

The best thing about Gaiman's stories is his language. So it is kind of weird that I still compare everything with Sandman and everything else just pales compared to it, including these stories.

And I find it weird that writers want to tell anything about their stories beforehand, like Gaiman does in the introduction and Joanne Harris did in her Jigs & Reels (I just read it).



I just realised that this was a ray not a ring. So I'll find out if there's still more Finnish bookcrossers who'd like to read this book and maybe start a new ray.

Received this by post. Sorry it took me some time to journal it but didn't have time to pick it up before Saturday. Thank you, chirel!

I really loved the book. I think I actually liked all of the stories, only some of the poems weren't that great. I especially can't seem to stop thinking about October in the Chair and Closing Time. Other People was also great. What I didn't like that much was the introduction, or to be more specific, putting it in the beginning of the book. I generally hate introductions and forewords because they always include spoilers, and I've tried to learn to read them only after I've read the book. In this case I always tried to read the story first and then what Gaiman had to say about it afterwards, which turned out to be a good idea although a few times I ended up reading the intro first which I then regretted. This was especially the case with the Problem of Susan. I would have liked to know how long it would have taken me to realize who Susan was if I hadn't read the introduction.

I have the book currently with me in Vienna (I read most of it on a trip to Budapest) and since I have far too much stuff already to bring back to Helsinki I would like to release the book here. If anyone has anything against this plan, please let me know within a week or so.

The book is in Prague!! Thank you so much, both chirel and silkki. Looks lovely, I am looking forward to read it.

(...and special thanks to silkki for the coins of coffee... I think I´ll have it with THIS book. Hope to return the favour some time!)