Neverwhere
A chance meeting on the streets of London propels Richard Mayhew, an ordinary young businessman, into a timeless and fantastical parallel world beneath the streets of the nation’s capital. The bemused and reluctant hero has to face conspiracies, betrayals, mythical monsters and unseen dangers if he is ever going to find his way to the surface and the world he is familiar with.
Taking a TV series and converting it into a book of prose is no mean feat, especially when the author had at the time no past experience in writing full-length novels. This makes it all the more of a pleasant surprise to find that Neverwhere is a damn good piece of fantasy fiction. His characteristic writing style, delivered with dry humour and making the hard-to-imagine very real indeed, is perfectly suited to the dark and strange world of London Below in which poor Mayhew finds himself and makes an accessible tale that would otherwise be hard to swallow for many. Gaiman’s love of - or at the very least, fascination with - the city of London is also very much evident: in a brilliant act of lateral thinking he takes familiar names of landmarks and places, twisting them unpredictably to give an imaginative and richly realised world to explore that is instantly familiar but at the same time completely unfamiliar.
Knightsbridge is an underground bridge that hides unspeakable terrors; the Angel Islington is a real and mysterious heavenly being; Earl’s Court is a medieval-style court contained within a Tube train. As we follow Mayhew through the sewers and Underground tunnels we meet a colourful and memorable cast of characters including courageous hunters, likeable crooks, immortal murderers and countless other individuals who have ‘fallen through the cracks’ of the London Above and end up in the world below where time is fluid and nothing is as it seems.
As impressive as the fantasy aspects are, it is the cast of characters that really brings the story to life. Seeing the way in which Mayhew is gradually changed by his experiences is interesting in itself, not least because it highlights a few home truths about our own world - through his eyes we see London from a different perspective, the London that is a mirror image of the one we know. His journey is emotional as well as being through a strange parallel universe and the likes of Door, Hunter and the Marquis de Carabas are so vibrant that they will linger long in the memory.
On the downside Neverwhere’s setting and characters are almost too deep and interesting: there is scarcely enough room on the pages to realise their full potential and by the time you’ve finished reading you can’t help but feel that there is so much more to explore. Perhaps this is why this story, out of all the books that Gaiman has written to date, is the prime candidate for a sequel; fans will no doubt be delighted if and when it materialises.
The edition currently available in the UK is the ‘author’s preferred’ version that has been the subject of minor edits and tweaks to the narrative. The prologue section for instance, in which we meet the gleefully evil Croup and Vandermaar, is moved to an appendix section at the end; there are also some discussion questions and a written interview with the author that offer some food for thought afterwards.
In Summary
Neverwhere is an engrossing and imaginative piece of fantasy fiction that draws the reader effortlessly into the author’s dark and fantastical vision. Chances are you’ll never look at the sights of London in the same light again…
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