Unless you’ve been insensate for the last ten years or so, you know that Mr. Gaiman is a book world superstar with novels, short stories, and children’s books to his credit. I loved American Gods and Smoke and Mirrors, so I knew I was in for a treat when I picked up The Ocean at the End of the Lane. It’s received amazing press and Mr. Gaiman commands round-the-block lines whenever he reads at a local bookstore. 

Now, I found American Gods suspenseful, and Smoke and Mirrors occasionally chilling, but The Ocean At the End of the Lane is downright terrifying. It’s a tribute to Mr. Gaiman’s storytelling that I kept reading, because the whole novel turns around big time child endangerment, which is almost always a book-closer for me. I went into this one not knowing anything about the plot, though, so I wasn’t really prepared for how frightening the book would become.

To say much about the plot would make me feel like a thief in the night, so I’ll refrain.

But you should read this. You’re going to fall in love with the Hempstock family.