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Neverwhere
by Neil Gaiman
Richard Mayhew’s
life is forever changed by a simple act of kindness. He is lost
to the world he has known because he stops to aid a injured
young woman named Door. She is a member of an invisible
underclass, residents of London Below, a netherworld stuck
somewhere between the past and a parallel dimension. This London
seems to rise from the collective dreams of all who have walked
its foggy streets. Yet, it remains always at the periphery of
conventional reality, a tide pool for those discarded or
forgotten.
Without realizing it, Mayhew abandons his place in London
society. His fiancé fails to recognize him, his job seems never
to have existed, his flat is rented out and his possessions
carted away. Mayhew searches desperately for Door, his one
contact is this strange and often terrifying world. But Door is
the target of two relentless killers, spirits who have walked
the worlds from the dawn of time. Door and her compatriots, are
on a quest to find a hidden key for an angel named Islington.
For good or ill, their ultimate success rests in Mayhew’s
hands.
Neil Gaiman asks
his reader for a simple act of trust, not kindness. A simple
turn of the page will draw the reader into London Below.
Gaiman’s double world is at once a potent commentary on the
worlds of wealth and poverty in which we are mired, and a
powerful allegory suggesting ways to build bridges to span the
gaps between them. Door is aptly named for she possesses the
power to connect the disparate and often fractious sections of
London underground. A door is an opportunity for communication,
contact. But one must have the courage to open it and walk
through. Like Mayhew, the reader may wish to linger down in the
mysterious and ever-changing London Below. For Mayhew, the
choice is absolute and irrevocable. For us, the door is always
open.
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