Fragile Things
by Neil Gaiman
Headline, £17.99; 366pp

Dreamsongs
by George R.R. Martin
Gollancz, £20; 1,185pp

THE WORLD OF Brian Ruckley’s Winterbirth was abandoned in disgust by its gods after two of the five races that they had created teamed up to exterminate a third.

But, as one character remarks: “Men must find something to worship once their gods abandon them.” For some it’s power, for others wealth, while a disturbing number adopt a new religion, known as the Black Road, and set about converting or killing unbelievers, believing it their duty to bring about the preordained end of human history.

There are no magical spells, no dragons, no wizards, and the landscape is recognisably our own — forest and mountain, marshland and sea coast, full of familiar plants and animals. Ruckley writes vividly about the natural world. Only the history is totally invented, and that comes to life through the experiences of those caught up in the chaos of war, and the powerfully realised settings.

My one complaint is that too many of the names are awkward, bristling with unlikely apostrophes (In’hynyr, Ess’yr, Igryn oc Dargannan-Haig). That aside, Winterbirth is written with great assurance and tells a gripping story that builds to a grim climax. No one who enjoys heroic fantasy should miss this.

Neil Gaiman’s Fragile Things is a beautiful book, from the elegant cover to the typeface and binding, and there are some wonderful stories inside: Sunbird is a joyful homage to the late, great R. A. Lafferty; Bitter Grounds a mini-novel of existential horror and academia; while The Monarch of the Glen brings the protagonist of American Gods to the Highlands of Scotland for another encounter with legend.

Also included are the Hugo award-winning A Study in Emerald, the Locus award-winners October in the Chair and Closing Time, half a dozen poems, and very likely everything else (barring screenplays) that Gaiman has written since his last collection. So, less wonderfully, there is also a monologue written to accompany a picture of a sock monkey (picture not included), material based on some Tori Amos songs, and two surprisingly silly stories, including one used in promotional material for The Matrix. But, as the author says in his introduction: “The book would cost you the same with or without them”, and we are free to skip.

Before he became the bestselling author of A Song of Ice and Fire, George R. R. Martin had been writing professionally for more than 20 years and was highly regarded. Dreamsongs is a celebration of that career, and includes all his best shorter fiction, as well as extended authorial notes which practically comprise an autobiography. The book was originally published in 2003 by a small press in America in an illustrated limited edition and is finally widely available in this country. Considering that it runs to more than half a million words of world-class storytelling, it’s a bargain.

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