Second Sandman volume, as good as the first (The Sandman: The Doll's House - Neil Gaiman)

Member Name: DancingCopper

Product:	The Sandman: The Doll's House - Neil Gaiman
Date:	14/10/08 (58 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Introduces more interesting characters, stories range from darkly humorous to tragic

Disadvantages: Sometimes not easy to follow the flow of images

The Doll's House is the second volume of Neil Gaiman's 'Sandman' series. It follows Preludes and Nocturnes and comes before Dream Country. You don't need to know this, but it took me ages to read them in the right order and I think it's better when you do.

Once again, there are seperate stories linked with a through-plot. Having regained his freedom and control of his realm, Dream (Morpheus) seeks to gain control of the creatures that inhabit people's dreams and nightmares. It turns out, four of them are missing, including a particularly nasty character called 'The Corinthian'. There is also a seemingly ordinary girl who seems to be drawing these dreams and Morpheus to her.

The volume opens with the story of how Morpheus fell in love and the tragic consequences of this. What is clever about this is that it helps us feel sympathy for Morpheus, who at times is a dour and sulky individual, called as much by his siblings. Gaiman gives Morpheus a tragically heroic aspect - he is imprisoned by the duties he has to fulfil, describing himself as a servant of humanity, not a master. This becomes evermore important as you work your way through the volumes of 'The Sandman'.

We are then introduced to two more of Morpheus' siblings (having met Death in the last volume). Desire and Despair are another of Gaiman's grotesque double acts. Whereas Dream and Death strive to bring order to chaos, their younger siblings seem to enjoy the opposite. Their appearance in The Doll's House, tie up some of the events in Preludes and Nocturnes - something that recurs throughout the entire collection.

The Doll's House contains excellent examples of Gaiman's dark and surreal humour, as well as his ability to tap into our 'what if...' part of the brain. The most well-crafted episode concerns a convention for serial killers. The modus operendi of several of these characters are gruesomely illustrated, as they fawn over each other as 'admirers of their work'. It's disturbing, funny and tragic, with the Corinthian playing a mesmeric and antiheroic lead.

My favourite story in The Doll's House, and one of my favourites in the whole series, concerns Morpheus' encounter with Hob Gadling. Death persuades Morpheus to pay more attention to ordinary people, and the two visit a tavern in the middle ages. Hob raves about how he won't die and is overheard by Death and Morpheus. The two agree that Hob won't die until he wishes it and Morpheus arranges to meet him every hundred years in the same tavern. We see each of these encounters, with Hob describing his successes and failures, but never once losing his enjoyment of living.

Again, these encounters portray a more human side to Morpheus, enabling us to warm to him and ultimately to sympathise with his role. Hob recurs as a character in later volumes, and at times plays a sidekick to Morpheus. During one of these meetings, Morpheus has a passing encounter with William Shakespeare, a relationship that develops interestingly in later volumes.

The illustrations are, again, not the crispest. But they serve well enough to engage your imagination and, given the scope of the Sandman series, it is perhaps better they are like this. It means we can pad the images out ourselves.

Summary: Neil Gaiman's second volume of Sandman stories demonstrates masterful grasp of storytelling