Neil Gaiman's "The Sandman"

[Densetsu]

So I just recently got back into comic books. I started collecting them when I was 10 years old, but other interests took hold as I grew older and eventually I stopped collecting comics altogether.

Not counting manga, The Walking Dead is the first American comic I've read in 15 years. I blew through all 102 issues in all of 3 days, and it reminded me of how much I used to love reading comics as a little kid.

Now that I'm waiting for issue #103, I started thinking that I should look into other American comic books to hold me over. And then I remembered The Sandman.

I remember buying and reading several of the original issues in the early 90's, but I never really got into the series. For one thing, at the time I was a poor lad with little money and my parents didn't really support my reading of comic books (they only forked out cash if I wanted to buy a novel). Furthermore, The Sandman was $2.00 per issue, and that was really expensive for a comic book back then (I was used to paying $0.75-$1.25 per comic). I think another reason why I didn't cry and beg my parents for the $2.00 a month to get my Sandman fix was that my mind was too juvenile to fully appreciate the stories.

For the past 20 years I've been hearing all sorts of great things about this series. I've always meant to return to it someday, but I was never driven to do so until I got all caught up with The Walking Dead recently. So I went ahead and ordered all 5 volumes of The Absolute Sandman. Now I'm just waiting for his "6th volume" (The Absolute Death) to arrive in the mail next week. It cost me a pretty penny, but for books of this quality and for what has been hailed as "the greatest graphic novel of all time," I think it'll be worth it.

I'm pretty excited to start this series. Has anyone else read it? Anything you'd like to share about it? If you want to discuss the plot, please put spoilers in spoiler tags.

*EDIT*
Gaiman has recently announced that he will return to write one more story for this series, which is supposedly a prequel to the entire Sandman saga. It will be out in 2013, so I hope to finish this in time for the prequel's release.

 

[Cyan]

I've read one of his book, but I didn't know it was a monthly issue.
I have "Sandman - The Dreams Hunters" illustrated by Yoshitaka Amano.
(US cover) http://www.amazon.fr/The-Sandman-Hunters-Neil-Gaiman/dp/1840232048
(French cover) http://www.amazon.fr/Sandman-chasseurs-reves-Neil-Gaiman/dp/8484316475
You can watch few pages online here.

This one is a special story based in japan, and about Japanese's Kitsune.
Kistune are foxes transforming into human to trick them (but you already know that )


I'm not fond or American Comic's graphic and narrative style, but I didn't read a lot of them, so maybe I could like some others.
What I didn't like is that the one I read are often "fast skipping scenes", no relation between one block and the next one.
You have to imagine what happen between them. it's missing movement and fluidity.

I don't know how other Gaiman's book looks like, or what the story is.
I liked The Dreams Hunters, but I felt like it's a little incomplete and very short (a little "fast skipping" too, but the story itself, not the drawing, as it's only illustrations not a comics)

 

[Densetsu]

I've read one of his book, but I didn't know it was a monthly issue.
I have "Sandman - The Dreams Hunters" illustrated by Yoshitaka Amano.

The regular Sandman series was issued monthly. The Dream Hunters isn't part of the regular series; it's a separate story all on its own. So The Dream Hunters was a one-time issue. I think it's considered a spin-off from the monthly series.

And I forgot to mention it in my first post above, but I also have The Dream Hunters. It's in the pic to the right of the Absolute Sandman volumes. The title is at the bottom of the book, but it looks washed out and hard to see because of the poor lighting and crappy camera. The cover is different from the ones you linked because mine is the hardcover version. The US cover you linked is the paperback version

I liked The Dreams Hunters, but I felt like it's a little incomplete and very short (a little "fast skipping" too, but the story itself, not the drawing, as it's only illustrations not a comics)

The Absolute Sandman Vol. V contains a comic book version of The Dream Hunters. It's the same story, except it's done comic book-style.

 

[Cyan]

Thanks for that info.
I don't know if the main series will interest me, but I'll try to find the beginning of the story and see how I feel about it.