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Content snapshot
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Violence
A lot
Significant violence throughout — gods die badly; some scenes are disturbing in their specificity
Language
Some
Some strong language
Sexual Content
A lot
Explicit sexual content in multiple scenes, including scenes involving supernatural figures
Substance Use
Some
Moderate drinking and some drug use in the road-trip sections
Emotional Intensity
A lot
The loneliness of being a god no one believes in anymore; Shadow's grief and dislocation; the mythology of America as a place that eats what it imports
What this book is about
Shadow Moon is released from prison the day his wife dies in a car crash. Adrift and grieving, he takes a job as a bodyguard for the mysterious Mr. Wednesday — a conman and, as Shadow slowly discovers, the Norse god Odin, traveling America to recruit the old gods for a war against the new ones: Media, Technology, the Internet, the system itself. Neil Gaiman's American Gods is a road novel, a mythology, and a meditation on what happens to belief when it crosses an ocean and finds a country that doesn't have the old roots to sustain it. Deeply mythological, consistently surprising, and quietly devastating in its final act. This edition also includes Anansi Boys, a companion novel.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
explicit sexual content in multiple scenes
graphic violence — gods and humans both die badly
deeply mythological — rewarding for readers familiar with world mythology
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