There’s nothing wrong with Neil Gaiman’s ODD AND THE FROST GIANTS per se, but when you put it up against his other children’s books like THE GRAVEYARD BOOK and CORALINE, it simply seems flat.
Perhaps that’s because it originally was written as a freebie for World Book Day, an event to which authors contribute works, in an effort to get kids to read. That’s a noble cause, and I’m sure ODD sparked many an imagination among the children who found it in their hands, but it lacks his usual emotional investment.
Odd — named for the tip of a sword, not for being unusual — is a 12-year-old boy with a dead dad and a bum right leg. Sick of his abusive stepfather, he leaves home and sets out to live in a hut, despite wintery conditions. A fox and an eagle lead him to a bear, whose leg is trapped in a tree. With a few swings of an ax, Odd frees the beast from his predicament.
These animals can talk. That’s because they’re not animals at all, but the Norse gods Thor, Odin and Loki, having been turned into creatures by those tricky Frost Giants. Odd has to help this little menagerie get back to Asgard to defeat the giants, or else winter will never end, and plants, animals and people will die.
It reads like a fairy tale, infused with Gaiman’s usual wit. It’s missing an engaging plot; there’s simply not that much to it. Then again, that may be by design, as this is only 128 pages, including all the illustrations by LEMONY SNICKET‘s Brett Helquist. You won’t do wrong by giving it to the kids in your life, though. —Rod Lott
OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF THIS AUTHOR:
• ANANSI BOYS by Neil Gaiman
• BEOWULF: THE SCRIPT BOOK by Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary
• BLUEBERRY GIRL by Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess
• FRAGILE THINGS: SHORT FICTIONS AND WONDERS by Neil Gaiman
• THE GRAVEYARD BOOK by Neil Gaiman
Related posts:
- Blueberry Girl
- The Graveyard Book
- Prince of Stories: The Many Worlds of Neil Gaiman
- Make your bid for literary immortality!
- X-Men: Fairy Tales
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Read Odd and the Frost Giants sometime last year and had rather the same reaction IIRC. Rather more confused by the fact that its supposedly a sequel to Graveyard Book, but, of course, shares absolutely no connection to it.