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The Ocean at the End of the Lane Mass Market Paperback – Nov. 26 2019
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#1 New York Times Bestseller
UK National Book Awards Book of the Year
“Fantasy of the very best.”—Wall Street Journal
A groundbreaking work as delicate as a butterfly’s wing and as menacing as a knife in the dark, The Ocean at the End of the Lane is told with a rare understanding of all that makes us human, and shows the power of stories to reveal and shelter us from the darkness inside and out.
A middle-aged man returns to his childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the end of the road, where, when he was seven, he encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn’t thought of Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond that she’d claimed was an ocean) behind the ramshackle old farmhouse where she once lived, the unremembered past comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too frightening, too dangerous to have happened to anyone, let alone a small boy.
“[Gaiman’s] mind is a dark fathomless ocean, and every time I sink into it, this world fades, replaced by one far more terrible and beautiful in which I will happily drown.”
—New York Times Book Review
- Print length256 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherWilliam Morrow Paperbacks
- Publication dateNov. 26 2019
- Dimensions10.64 x 1.63 x 17.15 cm
- ISBN-100062459368
- ISBN-13978-0062459367
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Review
“[W]orthy of a sleepless night . . . a fairy tale for adults that explores both innocence lost and the enthusiasm for seeing what’s past one’s proverbial fence . . . Gaiman is a master of creating worlds just a step to the left of our own.” — USA Today on The Ocean at the End of the Lane
“Remarkable . . . wrenchingly, gorgeously elegiac. . . . [I]n The Ocean at the End of the Lane, [Gaiman] summons up childhood magic and adventure while acknowledging their irrevocable loss, and he stitches the elegiac contradictions together so tightly that you won’t see the seams.” — Star Tribune (Minneapolis) on The Ocean at the End of the Lane
“Gaiman has crafted an achingly beautiful memoir of an imagination and a spellbinding story that sets three women at the center of everything. . . .[I]t’s a meditation on memory and mortality, a creative reflection on how the defining moments of childhood can inhabit the worlds we imagine.” — Journal Sentinel (Milwaukee, WI)
“His prose is simple but poetic, his world strange but utterly believable―if he was South American we would call this magic realism rather than fantasy.” — The Times (London) on THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE
“Poignant and heartbreaking, eloquent and frightening, impeccably rendered, it’s a fable that reminds us how our lives are shaped by childhood experiences, what we gain from them and the price we pay.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“[A] compelling tale for all ages . . . entirely absorbing and wholly moving.” — New York Daily News on The Ocean at the End of the Lane
“[A] story concerning the bewildering gulf between the innocent and the authoritative, the powerless and the powerful, the child and the adult. . . . Ocean is a novel to approach without caution; the author is clearly operating at the height of his career.” — The Atlantic Wire on The Ocean at the End of the Lane
“Ocean has that nearly invisible prose that keeps the focus firmly on the storytelling, and not on the writing. . . . This simple exterior hides something much more interesting; in the same way that what looks like a pond can really be an ocean.” — io9
“This slim novel, gorgeously written, keeps its talons in you long after you’ve finished.” — New York Post on The Ocean at the End of the Lane
“In Gaiman’s latest romp through otherworldly adventure, a young boy discovers a neighboring family’s supernatural secret. Soon his innocence is tested by ancient, magical forces, and he learns the power of true friendship. The result is a captivating read, equal parts sweet, sad, and spooky.” — Parade on The Ocean at the End of the Lane
“’The Ocean at the End of the Lane’ is fun to read, filled with his trademarked blend of sinister whimsy. Gaiman’s writing is like dangerous candy―you’re certain there’s ground glass somewhere, but it just tastes so good!” — Bookish (Houston Chronicle book blog)
“The impotence of childhood is often the first thing sentimental adults forget about it; Gaiman is able to resurrect, with brutal immediacy, the abject misery of being unable to control one’s own life.” — Laura Miller, Salon
“[W]ry and freaky and finally sad. . . . This is how Gaiman works his charms. . . . He crafts his stories with one eye on the old world, on Irish folktales and Robin Hood and Camelot, and the other on particle physics and dark matter.” — Chicago Tribune on The Ocean at the End of the Lane
“When I finally closed the last page of this slim volume it was with the realization that I’d just finished one of those uncommon perfect books that come along all too rarely in a reader’s life.” — Charles DeLint, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction on The Ocean at the End of the Lane
From the Back Cover
UK National Book Awards 2013 "Book of the Year"
"Fantasy of the very best." Wall Street Journal
A middle-aged man returns to his childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the end of the road, where, when he was seven, he encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn't thought of Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond that she'd claimed was an ocean) behind the ramshackle old farmhouse where she once lived, the unremembered past comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too frightening, too dangerous to have happened to anyone, let alone a small boy.
A groundbreaking work as delicate as a butterfly's wing and as menacing as a knife in the dark, The Ocean at the End of the Lane is told with a rare understanding of all that makes us human, and shows the power of stories to reveal and shelter us from the darkness inside and out.
"[Gaiman's] mind is a dark fathomless ocean, and every time I sink into it, this world fades, replaced by one far more terrible and beautiful in which I will happily drown." New York Times Book Review
About the Author
Neil Gaiman is the New York Times bestselling and multi-award winning author and creator of many beloved books, graphic novels, short stories, film, television and theatre for all ages. He is the recipient of the Newbery and Carnegie Medals, and many Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, and Will Eisner Awards. Neil has adapted many of his works to television series, including Good Omens (co-written with Terry Pratchett) and The Sandman. He is a Goodwill Ambassador for the UN Refugee Agency UNHCR and Professor in the Arts at Bard College. For a lot more about his work, please visit: https://www.neilgaiman.com/
Product details
- Publisher : William Morrow Paperbacks (Nov. 26 2019)
- Language : English
- Mass Market Paperback : 256 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0062459368
- ISBN-13 : 978-0062459367
- Item weight : 1.05 kg
- Dimensions : 10.64 x 1.63 x 17.15 cm
- Best Sellers Rank: #97,183 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #152 in Greek & Roman Mythology
- #156 in Celtic Mythology
- #579 in Holiday Fiction
- Customer Reviews:
About the authors
Neil Gaiman is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of more than twenty books, including Norse Mythology, Neverwhere, and The Graveyard Book. Among his numerous literary awards are the Newbery and Carnegie medals, and the Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, and Will Eisner awards. He is a Professor in the Arts at Bard College.
Elise Hurst is a writer, fine artist and illustrator specialising in a vintage alternate reality peopled by (amongst others) lions and tigers and bears. Although she most frequently creates picture books, her work has featured in situations as varied as book covers and illustrated novels, to cards and prints, cd covers, chocolates and an imaginative advertising campaign. She works most frequently in the media of oils, watercolour and ink drawings.
She lives and works in Melbourne, Australia.
Recent books:
'The Ocean at the End of the Lane' by Neil Gaiman, illustrated by Elise Hurst.
'Trying' by Kobi Yamada, Elise Hurst
https://www.facebook.com/EliseHurstArtistIllustrator/
https://www.instagram.com/elise.hurst/
Photo credit: Darren James
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Our narrator is a 40 year old man, who returns to his childhood home in Sussex, England to attend a funeral. After the service, he speaks to the people he hasn't seen in decades and is asked about his wife, whom he no longer is with and his children, who are all grown up. He then takes his car and drives aimlessly and ends up on the street where he once lived. His house is now demolished and when he is 7 years old, his family had moved to a new home called the fairy rug. He continues to drive and ends up on a farm at the end of the lane. The farmhouse is where the Hempstock family lives. There is Lettie Hempstock, her mother and her grandmother. He had been best friends with Lettie, whom he has not thought about in years. At this same farm, a man had committed suicide in a stolen car. The past can be a frightening, strange and dangerous time for a 7 year old boy.
There are two central characters in this book. The first is the unnamed boy of seven and the second is his friend and protector, Lettie Hempstock, who says she is eleven years old and has been that age for a very long time. She tells him that she will protect him no matter what happens. The 7 year old boy lives with his parents and sister in a large home. He is a fearful, lonely and an unhappy little boy, who escapes by reading, running away to his laboratory, where he keeps his chemistry set. The laboratory is really a green-painted shed, far away as he could get from his home. He also knows a dozen ways of getting out of his parents' property and on to the lane that takes him to see his best and only friend, Lettie. They would go to the pond together, but Lettie always called it the ocean.
The little boy's parents are having financial problems and his mother has to go out and work. She finds a job as an optometrist and now has to find someone to look after the children. The parents hire a housekeeper by the name of Ursula Monkton in exchange for room and board. The young boy has to give up his bedroom and share a room with his sister. He is treated like an outcast in his family. No one seems to have time to find out what is troubling the young boy and he becomes even more fearful with the arrival of Ursula, "the monster and flea." Horrifying incidents continue to happen and the 7 year old feels powerless to stand up to the force of an adult. In order to deal with his fears and nightmares, he creates an imaginary world that includes Lettie, his protector, and her family etc.
This book deals with abuse, family problems, infidelity and one frightened little 7 year old boy. Could it be that the unnamed little boy is Neil Gaiman?
If you have never read a book by Neil Gaiman and this book is my first, just cozy up in your favourite chair and experience the beautiful, magical and creative writing of this author. The Ocean at the End of the Lane is only 178 pages, but you will be transported to a different world that you will not want to leave. I am certain of that.
Enjoy!
I am now a fan of this writer and look forward to reading his other books.
This book merits FIVE STARS.
Firstly is this an adult novel? I don't think so. Now all Neil's books are worth the read. His books for young adults are delightful and I've read every one and The Ocean is one of those. There is no way that I could bring myself to accept that this is an adult novel.
Secondly is this a full length novel? Absolutely not. Weighing in at around 178 pages this is clearly a slightly extended short story. I feel the publisher has been deceitful in claiming this book to be what it is clearly not so they can charge a higher price for it. This is a good story, but it is no Neverwhere, Anansi Boys or American Gods and it leaves me disappointed. You will probably finish it in one sitting, and feel a little cheated.
Another point to mention is that my book arrived in a very poorly produced state. The pages were all different widths and rather than cut with a guillotine, look more like they were torn out. Poor quality paper too. I returned mine and the replacement I got was the same, so it is obviously a bad batch from the publisher. I tried to contact the publisher and Neil's people through Facebook to ask about this and to date they have not had the decency to respond. This is no way to treat people like me that rush out on the publishing date to secure every book he writes.
So the conclusion to this is that it rates 4 stars just because it is a good read. If I were to rate it on quality of the book, being a short story rather than a full length novel and being a young adult book rather than an adult novel, it would probably get only 2 stars.
I am one of the faithful, ever since Good Omens and am left disappointed.
We are now discussing, those of us who have read it, what exactly happened.... This book is wonderfully imaginitive and the world through the eyes of a seven year old boy, mostly, is a very different place. THIS is the reason we are unsure about what this story actually was. Curently we cannot decide if the story that the main character is describing has actually happened or if it is what a young childs mind has turned a real life situation into in order to better cope with what reality is throwing at him. As a reader I cannot decide if this book is a fantasy, plain and simple, or if it is a tragic reimagining of a difficult time in the narrators life when he did not truly understand the evils of reality and the tragic ups and downs of life.
Either way I enjoyed the book, whether there is a deeper meaning that I am only barely grasping or if it is what it is, it was a great read. Tragedy and sorrow intermingled with fear and loathing laced with a certain .... innocence and my favorite, passionate love of reading.
I actually really enjoy the conversations that this book has started amongst friends. We have had some lively chats already about what it meant and I think as more of us read it that will only grow until we are satisifed that we know what's what. I appreciate that this book has started a dialogue and expect it will do so for most of it's readers.
Top reviews from other countries
Reviewed in France on March 3, 2022
La historia es muy emotiva, nostálgica y conmovedora, ese realismo mágico que pasa de un sueño a la realidad y viceversa. Si saben inglés y quieren empezar con un libro de Neil Gaiman que no sea tan infantil como puede ser Coraline o Stardust les recomendaría a parte de El libro del cementerio, este sin lugar a dudas. Soy coleccionista y aunque está es una edición que normalmente no taeria en la calle leyendo es una edición que bien vale la pena tener en casa solo de lo hermosa que es.