[.ca] Sandman, The: Endless Nights (ISBN 1401200893)

like visiting old friends, & they don't have much to say:
As a whole, this Sandman collection is weak. Death & Dream have the strongest stories by far. The Delerium & Despair tales are tepid & confusing. Desire & Destruction have so-so appearances & Destiny's story is pretty much redundant. It's hard to give this collection 3 stars- I was really looking forward to it. The first 10 Sandman books are beautiful. I treasure them. And this was the first 'spin-off' (as in not directly, sequentially linked to the others) that appeared promising. It was fairly enjoyable- it just wasn't on par with the others storywise (the artwork is lovely). If you've read everything else, by all means read it. I'm just happy I checked it out of the library. If you're new to Sandman start at the beginning, with 'Preludes & Nocturnes'; I doubt you'll regret it.

Enjoyable for the most part:
First, let me say that I am a big fan of Neil Gaiman. That having been said, I enjoyed Endless Nights, but couldn't stay with the stories about Delirium and Despair- the artwork was just too distracting. Not that it is bad, mind you. For me, it's just too abstract to work with following graphic stories panel after panel. I would still recommend this work for Gaiman fans. My satisfaction with most chapters easily outweighs any disappointment in a few others.

Buy the hardcover version if you can:
For those of you ready to take the plunge in making purchase of this excellent graphic novel, do yourself a favor and spend the few extra bucks on the hardcover version. For starters the hardback is slightly oversized and the thick, glossy paperstock wonderfully frames every panel of this diverse and beautifully illutrated book. Fans of Neil Gaiman will find much to be delighted about in this return to his beloved, 'Sandman,' series. Made up of 7 chapters, each chronicles one of the Endless (Death, Desire, Dream, Despair, Delirium, Destruction and Destiny) in a self-contained story superbly illustrated by a different artist. Particular standouts are Milo Manara's contributions in 'Desire,' the subdued tones of Miguelanxo Prado in 'Dream,' and Barron Storey and Dave McKean's gritty work in 'Despair.' As a volume of bonus material post-Sandman, this book is a wonderful treat for fans and certainly lives up to the quality we've come to expect from Gaiman and company.

Strong book:
This is the second Sandman volume I have read, and I was not disappointed. Turned off by the gore in the first volume, the story still managed to intrigue me enough to read another, which turned out to be Endless Nights. I must say, knowing a bit of the background helped, but even if you haven't read any volumes previously, you will still enjoy this surreal work. Not every chapter is strong, however. Death's tale is a strong opener. Desire is also very solid (though is a little graphic, as perhaps a story about "Desire" should be). I agree with previous reviewers that Despair and Delirium are a bit too abstract, and you have to struggle to stay interested. Those two tales could be 3 pages long and you'd still get the idea. Destruction is interesting, but nothing breakthrough. Destiny, the final chapter, also doesn't really cover anything new or unexpected, but wraps things up nicely. Dream's story was my favorite though. It's a special treat for any Green Lantern fans out there. I'll say no more about that, except that non-fans will still throughly enjoy the story, as the GL references will pass unknown before their eyes. In conclusion, three of the stories are EXCELLENT, two are still good, and two are weak. That's five out of seven I can recommend, otherwise the volume would have had 5 stars.

A great gift for SANDMAN fans:
ENDLESS NIGHTS is, well, a dream come true for fans of Neil Gaiman's comic book series THE SANDMAN. Endless Nights is a collection of 7 short stories written by Gaiman and featuring fan-favourite artists such as Glenn Fabry, Bill Seinkiewicz, Frank Quietly, & P. Craig Russell among others. Each of the 7 stories focuses on one of the 7 members of The Endless (Death, Destiny, Dream, Despair, Desire, Delirium, & Destruction) beings which came before anything and will be around after all the gods are dead and gone. My personal favourite was the story about Dream. It offers a lot of history on The Endless and has more than a few surprises for fans of THE SANDMAN series. A let down was the story on Death. Gaiman himself has written somewhat similar stories for Death so it had a "been-there-done-that" feel to it. A big surprise is the Desire story, which reads like an old Norse legend. Great twist ending, too. Bottom line is this is a must have for all SANDMAN fans. Buy this book now! And for new readers I wouldn't say Endless NIGHTS is the best jumping off point to the SANDMAN universe (that would be vol 1) as people who've read THE SANDMAN series will get more out of it. However, it's not necessarily a bad starting off point either. If you know Gaiman's work from novels or other comics, ENDLESS NIGHTS will intrigue you as they are stand-alone stories that have aspects that do blend in to other SANDMAN stories. Just be sure to come back to it for a 2nd reading after you've read the other 10 vol. of SANDMAN.