or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
 
More Buying Choices
24 used & new from £3.39
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
 
   
Fragile Things
 
See larger image 
Share your own customer images
Publisher: learn how customers can search inside this book.

Fragile Things (Paperback)

by Neil Gaiman (Author)
4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
RRP: £7.99
Price: £5.97 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
You Save: £2.02 (25%)
o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o
In stock.
Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk. Gift-wrap available.

Want guaranteed delivery by Tuesday, November 10? Choose Express delivery at checkout. See Details
19 new from £3.39 5 used from £3.42
Other Editions: RRP: Our Price: Other Offers:
Hardcover 3 used & new from £4.00
Paperback (Export, Airside & Ireland ed) 6 used & new from £3.95
Audio Download (Unabridged) £16.63 £11.69

Frequently Bought Together

Fragile Things + Smoke and Mirrors + Anansi Boys
Price For All Three: £17.91

Show availability and shipping details

  • This item: Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman

    In stock.
    Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk.
    This item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions

  • Smoke and Mirrors by Neil Gaiman

    In stock.
    Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk.
    This item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions

  • Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman

    In stock.
    Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk.
    This item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought

Smoke and Mirrors

Smoke and Mirrors

by Neil Gaiman
3.9 out of 5 stars (25)  £5.97
Anansi Boys

Anansi Boys

by Neil Gaiman
4.3 out of 5 stars (19)  £5.97
American Gods

American Gods

by Neil Gaiman
3.9 out of 5 stars (110)  £5.00
Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text

Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text

by Neil Gaiman
4.4 out of 5 stars (86)  £5.97
The Graveyard Book

The Graveyard Book

by Neil Gaiman
4.5 out of 5 stars (46)  £4.47
› Explore similar items

Product details

  • Paperback: 448 pages
  • Publisher: Headline Review (5 April 2007)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0755334140
  • ISBN-13: 978-0755334148
  • Product Dimensions: 19.4 x 12.8 x 3.2 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 13,170 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #19 in  Books > Fiction > Authors, A-Z > G > Gaiman, Neil

    •  Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?

Product Description

Review

'Predominantly dark, the stories are occasionally whimsical and satirical, and at times humorous, but the book’s underlying theme is fragility and how people, dreams and hearts are so easily broken’

(Sun Herald )

'Immensely entertaining ... Combines the anarchy of Douglas Adams with a Wodehousian generosity of spirit'

(Susanna Clarke )


Product Description

A stunning book of short stories by the acclaimed fantasy writer. The distinctive genius of Neil Gaiman has been championed by writers as diverse as Norman Mailer and Stephen King. With THE SANDMAN Neil Gaiman created one of the most sophisticated, intelligent and influential graphic novel series of our time. Now after the recent success of his latest novel ANANSI BOYS, Gaiman has produced FRAGILE THINGS, his second collection of short fiction. These stories will dazzle your senses, haunt your imagination and move you to the very depths of your soul. This extraordinary book reveals one of the world’s most gifted storytellers at the height of his powers.
See all Product Description

Tags Customers Associate with This Product

 (What's this?)
Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
 
(1)
(1)

Your tags: Add your first tag
 
See most popular tags

What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

Fragile Things
47% buy the item featured on this page:
Fragile Things 4.0 out of 5 stars (8)
£5.97
Anansi Boys
15% buy
Anansi Boys 4.3 out of 5 stars (19)
£5.97
Smoke and Mirrors
13% buy
Smoke and Mirrors 3.9 out of 5 stars (25)
£5.97
Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text
13% buy
Neverwhere: The Author's Preferred Text 4.4 out of 5 stars (86)
£5.97
Explore similar items
 

Customer Reviews

8 Reviews
5 star:
 (4)
4 star:
 (2)
3 star:    (0)
2 star:
 (2)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.0 out of 5 stars (8 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
25 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Dreams and unusual realities , 25 Nov 2006
By Friederike Knabe (Ottawa, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Fragile Things (Hardcover)
Gaiman is a writer of rich and vivid imagination. This collection of short stories, short fiction and poems demonstrate his talent on every page. Hovering between reality and fantasy he has created a distinctive world peopled with ordinary people, young and old, who meet up with ghosts, zombies and other creatures. With great skill and ease Gaiman creates credible characters and compelling scenarios.

Some "fragile things" describe dreams, others move effortlessly from actuality to visions of otherworldliness often taking the reader by surprise. Most of the stories in this collection have a serious, some a macabre, side to them. At the same time, humour and irony are natural companions. There is the young boy, ignored by his family and peers, who finally meets a friend and companion as he runs away to start a new life. A Harlequin character reinvents himself with every real life Valentine heart he sends to an object of his desire. Storytelling is a theme for many of the characters in the collection. In "October in the Chair" we listen in as every month competes for the best story that the others haven't heard before. Many of the stories were inspired by other writers and friends and fiction pieces were written for their magazines or anthologies.

While each of the stories has been published previously, it is a treat to have them collected in one volume. Every piece stands by itself, yet, when read contiguously each adds elements to a whole creating for the reader a complex tapestry of imaginary lives. Anybody who has read other Gaiman books will welcome his volume. For newcomers, Fragile Things is a great introduction to his work. [Friederike Knabe]
Comment Comment (1) | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars An interesting mix that's easy to read, 26 Jun 2007
By quippe (London, UK) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)      
Of the collection, I'd already read How To Speak To Girls At Parties and A Study In Emerald before and of the two, I think that A Study In Emerald is the stronger story. For those who don't know, A Study In Emerald is a hybrid of the Sherlock Holmes stories and Locecraft's Call of Cthulu, set in an alternative world where the Old Ones rule over man and one of their number has been murdered. Gaiman nails the tone and the narrative voice and the story itself is fascinating. How To Speak To Girls At Parties, by contrast, reads like fluff - it's amusing but the ending is weak.

With those stories that were new to me, I particularly enjoyed The Problem Of Susan, which looks at what happened to the fourth Pevensie sibling after her brothers and sister were permanently taken to Narnia. Gaiman makes Narnia a much darker place and subverts the antagonism between Aslan and the White Witch and whilst the reporter is a little forced at times, Susan herself is very believable. Harlequin Valentine is an entertaining take on the relationship between Harlequin and Columbine, with a neat twist at the end that makes you feel sorry for the trickster. Sunbird, a story that Gaiman wrote as a present for his daughter, Holly, is an amusing look at an epicuran society in their search for the ultimate gastronomic experience. Gaiman uses a stylised narrative that should jar, but doesn't and again, it has a very neat ending.

I didn't particularly enjoy Diseasemaker's Croup (the style's fine and I can see what he's doing with it, but it just didn't grab me) or Pages From A Journal Found In A Shoebox In A Greyhound Bus Somewhere Between Tulsa, Oklahoma and Louisville, Kentucky (which is too much of a stream of consciousness story that again, didn't grab me). I also felt that October In The Chair, a story that Gaiman says in his introduction was originally intended to be part of another collection, felt unfulfilling and whilst that's partly to do with the decidely open ending, it's also because you feel that there's a backstory there that needs to be developed further.

The collection finishes with a novella, a sort of follow-on to Gaiman's excellent novel, American Gods, in which Shadow has travelled to a remote part of Scotland, where he is invited to work as a bodyguard to an unusual party for one weekend. Whilst I think that the central hook of the story is a little contrived, Gaiman weaves in Norse legend with contemporary life in a way that carries the reader along nicely and his portrayal of Grendel is quite heartbreaking. It also made me want to see a full length sequel to American Gods as I think that Shadow is a fascinating and troubled character and one with more tales to tell.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Can do better, 6 Mar 2008
By C. A. Gallagher (Bristol) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)      
I'm generally a fan of Neil Gaiman's but didn't really enjoy this offering. I get the impression that it was put together more as an excuse to release the final story, "The Monarch of The Glen" where we once more meet Shadow, the "hero" of American Gods, rather than because of any peculiar merit in the stories and poems. If you are new to Gaiman's work don't start here - go straight to American Gods.

Still, whatever I may think of this particular collection, one can't help but envy NG's spectacular imagination.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)


Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Fragments of dreams and similar nonsense
"A Study in Emerald" is a story that mixes Lovecraft, Doyle and alternate reality into a really entertaining narrative that plays fair with both authors works, "The Day the... Read more
Published 5 months ago by Mr. J. Hebron

5.0 out of 5 stars `Shadow, Shadow, Shadow, Shadow, Shadow. This was not how things were meant to turn out.'
After finding `Smoke and Mirrors' patchy and `American Gods' (the writer's preferred version) a looong haul, it was so good to read this - instant confirmation that this is indeed... Read more
Published 15 months ago by Guy reid-brown

5.0 out of 5 stars Offbeat collection from a great storyteller
This might be an unusual review because this is the first Gaiman book I've read, bought it to see if all the fuss was justified, so I came with no preconceptions of what a Neil... Read more
Published 15 months ago by Andrew de Salis

2.0 out of 5 stars Forgettable - try Smoke and Mirrors instead
I'm a big fan of Neil Gaiman's books so I had high expectations of another short story collection but this book left me completely cold. Read more
Published on 25 Sep 2007 by Mr Smith

4.0 out of 5 stars It's creepy and it's spooky...
As Gaiman himself indicates in the preface, the first story in this book is Sherlock Holmes meets H P Lovecraft, and the rest of the stories are cut from the same creepy cloth... Read more
Published on 19 Jun 2007 by Aelfgifu55

Only search this product's reviews


Customer Discussions

This product's forum
Discussion Replies Latest Post
No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
 


Active discussions in related forums
   
Related forums

Look for similar items by category

Look for similar items by subject








i.e., each product must be in subject 1 AND subject 2 AND ...

Feedback

Ad

Your Recent History

 (What's this?)

After viewing product detail pages or search results, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in.