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Gaiman's Neverwhere is a lost place

by Ted Drozdowski

NEVERWHERE, by Neil Gaiman. Avon Books, 337 pages, $24.

Neil Gaiman has made his mark as the creator of an alternate universe where dreams can literally change the world and magic occurs with the frequency of Green Line breakdowns. Best known for the popular Sandman comic series, he's also taken to writing novels and short stories. Neverwhere is his latest words-sans-pictures effort. Its 20 chapters unfold a tale of mass assassination, murderous stalking, sleuthing, court intrigue, monsters, betrayal, alienation, friendship, and, of course, that alternative universe.

A promising stew. Yet Neverwhere can't quite transcend its Dungeons and Dragons mentality. Which is a pity, because Gaiman's work in Sandman is rich and literate. He's among the few comic authors who can grapple intelligently with issues of religious identity and morality within the fantasy genre. Any of the Sandman graphic novels come highly recommended to adults, for the depth of their characters -- especially the haunted, introspective Sandman -- and their compelling tales. There's little that's simple within their covers. And the artwork, from the psychedelic multi-paged frescoes to the neo-Gothic bearing of the major players and the generous color palette, lures the eye along.

As various clichés caution us, pictures do have a storytelling advantage over words. And Neverwhere's prose doesn't sparkle as it must to transcend its sword-and-sorcery genre conventions: an endangered princess, a hero who's a stranger in a strange land, a canny female berserker, a duplicitous overlord (who at least in this case is a fallen angel).

What Neverwhere has going for it is location and a handful of memorable characters. Gaiman has conjured a London beneath London -- a place for "the people who slip between the cracks," accessible by subway (convenient) or enchantment (harder to arrange) and aptly called London Below. It's an amalgam of the Paris sewers of Jean Valjean, Tim Burton's Gotham City, and the netherworld populated by Sandman's lords and demons. Think of Blade Runner imagined by Salvador Dalí in the 15th century. The novel's protagonist, Richard Mayhew, is a transplanted Scot who's delivered from London Above to London Below after he innocently shelters the hunted Lady Door from a pair of proudly self-described hired cutthroats. Think of him as the Jimmy Stewart character in a Hitchcock film, without any of Stewart's charm or personality.

Mayhew is pulled into Door's search for vengeance on those who murdered her family. (A vengeance that, it's worth noting, is neither particularly terrible nor satisfying.) That involves several encounters with the more-and-less-than-human assassins, and a labyrinthine journey to an angel's lair, a subway car that's an aged earl's court in disguise, an abbey populated by a cult of macabre but good-natured friars, and a literal staircase to Hell (or, more correctly, just short of it).

All the while, Mayhew pines for a return to his normal above-ground life: his dull job, his dominating fiancée, his modest flat. But he's so brown-corduroy-jacket drab, it's hard to care whether he's released from this blackhearted Oz or falls under the tusks and hooves of the bloodthirsty Beast of London. The Lady Door is equally one-dimensional.

We do meet a few entertaining supporting characters. Mr. Croup and Mr. Vandemar are the killers, a psychotic and humorously erudite Heckle and Jeckyl of violent crime who provide chuckles and chills. Another of Gaiman's colorful creations is the Marquis de Carabas, a wolfish fop whose veneer of warm insincerity covers a sturdy heart of pure polished brass. And there's Old Bailey, an eccentric Dickensian fellow who dwells on London Above's rooftops, living on birds and his canny instincts for trading and survival.

Good secondary players aren't enough to carry Gaiman's drama, however. Neverwhere's whodunit cum odyssey won't send readers snoring off to the traditional Sandman's realm -- especially Gaiman devotees. But his world's far less colorful on this book's all-gray pages.