Sandman: Preludes and Nocturnes

Preludes and Nocturnes is the first book of ten in Neil Gaiman's Sandman series. This series was actually my introduction to Gaiman. I bought the first one towards the end of high school and spent the majority of college collecting the rest of the volumes. I've since collected all of the additional volumes* as well and have read the series many times.

The first installment introduces the protagonist, Morpheus. He is the anthropomorphic representation of Dreams and King of the Dream Realm. The novel opens with him being captured by some arrogant warlocks during the Great War. They had planned to put a stop to death by capturing the anthropomorphic representation of Death so she couldn't go out and collect souls any more. Lucky for them, they ended up with her younger brother instead.

The warlocks keep Dream imprisoned for seventy years before he is finally able to escape, thanks to one of his guards growing lax and nodding off on his shift. Once free, Dream quickly punishes his captors and then sets off to find the tools that they stole from him and then lost. The first volume essentially follows this plot while Gaiman experiments with a few different horror styles.

Although this volume is probably the weakest of the series, it's still really good. It sets up the character of Dream and the world he inhabits. It plays around with the horror genre as Gaiman tries to figure out exactly what direction he wants to take this series in. And it hints at the fact that that this series will be about the act of storytelling as much as anything else.

I'm really excited to read this series again and see what new things I find this time through

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