The first 100 pages of this book are excellent. The beginning has a huge hook that really makes you want to know more about the protagonist, Shadow. Mr. Wednesday, the instigator of the plot throughout the book is a great character as are most of them memorable. However, it must be said that the middle of this book has no direction to the point at which some chapters can become quit boring. This novel could have easily lost 100 pages and become a much tighter story. I found myself reading certain sections of this book, wondering why Neil Gaiman's editor had not cut this section or that piece. It tended to ramble. The ending, however, was a good conclusion, if not a little predicatable.
If you like weird and wonderful characters with well-written descriptive prose then this may be the book for you. But if you like your novels to cough up the goods at a quick rather than leisured pace then avoid.

模範囚として三年間の服役を終え、愛する妻の元へ帰るはずの Shadow に悲報が届く。再会を目前にして、彼女が交通事故で死亡したというのだ。失意の中、我が家へと戻る途中の彼の前に、「Wednesday」と名乗る男が現れ、Shadow を助手として雇いたいと持ちかける。更に埋葬されたはずの妻が再び Shadow の前に姿を…。

「Wednesday」の正体はこの語源を知っていればすぐにわかるのですが、そういった説明は作中では明確にはされません。全体的に、北欧神話やエジプト神話・スラブ神話くらいは、読者が知っていることを前提に書かれているような感じです。知らなくても楽しめるのでしょうが、若干、意味不明の部分が残るかもしれません。
新旧の神々の戦いという題材のわりに、派手さはそれほどありません。ですが、現実と幻想が交錯する不思議な感じがとても魅力的な小説です。人間社会で地道に生計をたてる、しょぼくれた感じの古き神々がイイ味だしてます。また、小道具の使い方や、ちょっとしたエピソードの描写が非常に上手いと感じました。

Gaiman’s prose books have been missing something that that made Sandman so compelling. Good Omens were two friends having fun with an idea. Neverwhere was the director’s cut of the mini-series. Stardust was basically something to tell the kids. Goldfish was for the kids. Not since Sandman and his short stories has Gaiman truly written for the reader and only for the reader. It’s that last element that makes American Gods incredible. Each of the characters are compelling as some of the best Sandman characters, whether it is Death of the Endless or Hob Gadling. From the beginning, you’ll get sucked into Shadow’s life and feel the anguish that Shadow felt when he’s brought into the warden’s office and told about his wife’s death. You’ll even react the same way as Shadow when Wednesday jips the waitress, the only difference is that you’ll laugh when you hear how Wednesday defends his actions. It is truly about American Gods, not the Norse of which Odin is from nor is it or the combination of pagan and Christianity for Easter. It is about American Gods. These gods are as much of where they came from as a fully Americanized immigrant is. Sure, they still carry the same heritage, the foods that they eat and morals they brought. But once they have lived in the melting pot of America, they change and adapt to form a new personality. The new god such as fast food and internet are just as American as gods that came here. To carry on the analogy, these new gods can be comparable as the Americans that are born and bred here. It’s just that these new gods and Americans that are born and bred here are products of the melting pot. Now stray away from the analogy, the plot is about the storm of the old gods and the new gods with a grift involved.

You should read THe Price of Immortality it is a awsome book and written by C.M. Whitlock