This 50-minute CD contains four
children’s stories by Neil Gaiman, read by the author, plus a short interview
by his daughter.  It is strange to produce an audio version of these books
since the original versions are essentially picture books with wonderful art by
Dave McKean.  (See the review of The Wolves in the Walls in Metapsychology December 2003).  So it is a pleasant
surprise to find that these stories work well even without the art.  My
personal favorite is "The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish," in
which a boy wants to get his friend Nathan’s goldfish, and offers Nathan
transformer robots, baseball cards, books, and other toys, but Nathan isn’t
interested in the swap.  Eventually the boy is inspired, and offers his Dad. 
His Dad isn’t a great swap, because all he does is read the newspaper and he
can’t swim as well as goldfish, but Nathan agrees.  But the boy’s mother is
annoyed by the boy’s silly action, and insists that he go and get his Dad
back.  By the time he gets to Nathan’s though, it turns out that he has already
swapped the Dad for something else, an electric guitar. The boy ends up going
on a long trek trying to find his Dad, going from person to person.  His Dad
wasn’t a very good swap, so nobody kept him for long.  It’s a funny story,
because it shows how most people regret the swaps they do, and it also shows
how Dads don’t have a very good swap value, although the boy is eventually glad
to get him back. 

Neil Gaiman’s stories have a nice
combination of humor, fantasy and adventure, and this audio collection is
charming. Recommended. 

© 2004 Christian
Perring. All rights reserved.

Christian
Perring, Ph.D., is Academic Chair of the Arts & Humanities
Division and Chair of the Philosophy Department at Dowling College, Long Island. He is also
editor of Metapsychology Online Review.  His main research is on
philosophical issues in medicine, psychiatry and psychology.

Categories: Children