Skip to main content
The Ocean at the End of the Lane: A Novel

The Ocean at the End of the Lane: A Novel

Current price: $18.99
Publication Date: May 18th, 2021
Publisher:
William Morrow Paperbacks
ISBN:
9780063070707
Pages:
192
Usually Ships in 2 to 5 Days

Gaiman is a magnificent storyteller, creating scenes so complete that you aren't just reading, but rather inhabiting a universe that's thoroughly believable yet truly otherworldly. The story's terror -- the claustrophobia and vulnerability of childhood, the way a child's wants, needs, and fears go unnoticed by adults, and the horrors that can result -- is perfectly balanced against the consolation of books, the magic of the natural world, and the power of those who do listen, understand, and take action to set the universe to rights at whatever cost to themselves. Painful and wonderful, gorgeous and horrifying, truly fantastic, essential and classic, this is a book to return to again and again.

Carol Schneck Varner, Schuler Books & Music, Okemos, MI
July 2013 Indie Next List

Description

#1 New York Times Bestseller

From #1 New York Times bestselling author Neil Gaiman, a haunting novel that explores the awesome power of memory, friendship, and sacrifice―one of ten classic Gaiman works repackaged with elegant original watercolor art by acclaimed artist Henry Sene Yee

"A novel about the truths—some wonderful, some terrible—that children know and adults do not.” —Time Magazine

Returning to his childhood home to attend a funeral, a middle-aged man is drawn back to a place once alive with monsters and magic; to a past where the impossible is all too frighteningly real . . .

A haunting meditation on memory, wonder, friendship, and sacrifice, The Ocean at the End of the Lane, which was named “Book of the Year” by the UK National Book Awards, is a groundbreaking triumph of storytelling as delicate as a butterfly’s wing and as menacing as a knife in the dark.

About the Author

Neil Gaiman is the New York Times bestselling and multi-award winning author and creator of many beloved books, graphic novels, short stories, film, television and theatre for all ages. He is the recipient of the Newbery and Carnegie Medals, and many Hugo, Nebula, World Fantasy, and Will Eisner Awards. Neil has adapted many of his works to television series, including Good Omens (co-written with Terry Pratchett) and The Sandman. He is a Goodwill Ambassador for the UN Refugee Agency UNHCR and Professor in the Arts at Bard College. For a lot more about his work, please visit: https://www.neilgaiman.com/

Praise for The Ocean at the End of the Lane: A Novel

“[W]orthy of a sleepless night . . . a fairy tale for adults that explores both innocence lost and the enthusiasm for seeing what’s past one’s proverbial fence . . . Gaiman is a master of creating worlds just a step to the left of our own.” — USA Today on The Ocean at the End of the Lane

“Remarkable . . . wrenchingly, gorgeously elegiac. . . . [I]n The Ocean at the End of the Lane, [Gaiman] summons up childhood magic and adventure while acknowledging their irrevocable loss, and he stitches the elegiac contradictions together so tightly that you won’t see the seams.” — Star Tribune (Minneapolis) on The Ocean at the End of the Lane

“Gaiman has crafted an achingly beautiful memoir of an imagination and a spellbinding story that sets three women at the center of everything. . . .[I]t’s a meditation on memory and mortality, a creative reflection on how the defining moments of childhood can inhabit the worlds we imagine.” — Journal Sentinel (Milwaukee, WI)

“His prose is simple but poetic, his world strange but utterly believable—if he was South American we would call this magic realism rather than fantasy.” — The Times (London) on THE OCEAN AT THE END OF THE LANE

“Poignant and heartbreaking, eloquent and frightening, impeccably rendered, it’s a fable that reminds us how our lives are shaped by childhood experiences, what we gain from them and the price we pay.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“[A] compelling tale for all ages . . . entirely absorbing and wholly moving.” — New York Daily News on The Ocean at the End of the Lane

“[A] story concerning the bewildering gulf between the innocent and the authoritative, the powerless and the powerful, the child and the adult. . . . Ocean is a novel to approach without caution; the author is clearly operating at the height of his career.” — The Atlantic Wire on The Ocean at the End of the Lane

“Ocean has that nearly invisible prose that keeps the focus firmly on the storytelling, and not on the writing. . . . This simple exterior hides something much more interesting; in the same way that what looks like a pond can really be an ocean.” — io9

“This slim novel, gorgeously written, keeps its talons in you long after you’ve finished.” — New York Post on The Ocean at the End of the Lane

“In Gaiman’s latest romp through otherworldly adventure, a young boy discovers a neighboring family’s supernatural secret. Soon his innocence is tested by ancient, magical forces, and he learns the power of true friendship. The result is a captivating read, equal parts sweet, sad, and spooky.” — Parade on The Ocean at the End of the Lane

“’The Ocean at the End of the Lane’ is fun to read, filled with his trademarked blend of sinister whimsy. Gaiman’s writing is like dangerous candy—you’re certain there’s ground glass somewhere, but it just tastes so good!” — Bookish (Houston Chronicle book blog)

“The impotence of childhood is often the first thing sentimental adults forget about it; Gaiman is able to resurrect, with brutal immediacy, the abject misery of being unable to control one’s own life.” — Laura Miller, Salon

“[W]ry and freaky and finally sad. . . . This is how Gaiman works his charms. . . . He crafts his stories with one eye on the old world, on Irish folktales and Robin Hood and Camelot, and the other on particle physics and dark matter.” — Chicago Tribune on The Ocean at the End of the Lane

“When I finally closed the last page of this slim volume it was with the realization that I’d just finished one of those uncommon perfect books that come along all too rarely in a reader’s life.” — Charles DeLint, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction on The Ocean at the End of the Lane