Anansi Boys by Neil Gaimon (2005)

I guess this is the second Neil Gaiman book for adults I have read - the first being Stardust. Gaiman continues to intrigue me.He has a wonderful way of combining the every day with the magical. Charlie Nancy is living a fairly boring life in London as an accountant with a fiance. When his crazy father dies at a karaoke bar in Florida, he returns to his childhood home for the funeral and discovers that he has a brother - Spider. Well, it turns out that his father was really the trickster god - Anansi, a figure I was familiar with from kid books I read my son, especially Anansi the Spider by Gerald McDermott, which I will have to re-read, but am including here to remind me.

Gaiman's story is full of wonderful characters, like Charlie's evil boss who is

robbing his clients, the ghost of one of the clients, the female detective who is sent to investigate the inconsistencies, the group of elderly women neighbors back in Florida that are really a coven of witches, the fiance's awful mother, etc. As this is a modern day fairy tale, the author can do fantastical things, as bring all of his main characters together on a Caribbean island for the grand finale. 

I have occasionally wondered about what happened to the ancient gods. By definition, they live forever, so wouldn't they be among us today? I really like that Gaiman brings back into today's world one of the more interesting gods from West Africa. The story is fun, brings in various animal gods and powers, especially when Charlie goes to the underworld. Plus there are lessons to be learned. I loved watching both Charlie and Spider evolve.