Reviews

The Sandman Vol. 7: Brief Lives by Neil Gaiman

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cbarteau's review

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adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

kcrouth's review against another edition

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4.0

More of this great graphic narrative from Gaiman. It has become obvious to me that these stories are deep and penetrating, and deserve and demand re-reading. On to collection #8, "Worlds' End".

midici's review against another edition

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5.0

I say this about practically every one, but Brief Lives was my favourite Sandman book so far. Delirium, who used to be Delight is a fascinating character, and the driving force behind the plot of this seventh book. Delirium decides in the beginning of the book that she wants to find her missing brother, Destruction. Destruction's disappearance has been mentioned in previous books. It was said that 'he decided to leave' and that his siblings had decided to 'respect his decision.' In truth, every time the topic came up each of the Endless looked miserable.

In order to set out on this quest, Delirium recruits Morpheus' help. Morpheus, evidently coming out of a bad break up (with who?), decides to come along mostly to occupy himself. The characters they meet are also fascinating. Long-lived humans living seemingly dull, uninteresting lives. Fallen gods who transitioned to not-quite-mortal, yet no longer gods. We get to see more of Despair and her realm, and get a much better sense of how Delirium wanders through the realms making no sense at all.

Morpheus and Delirium make for hilarious traveling companions simply because they are so unalike. When Morpheus calls Matthew into the mortal realm for the sole purpose of telling Delirium how to drive I actually starting laughing out loud. It was satisfying to have the duo complete their journey. They find their brother who, despite his nature, seems to have tried his hand at creating all sorts of things: sculptures (bad), poetry (awful), paintings (in his dog's opinion, horrendous), cooking, etc. He tells Morpheus that he did abandon his post, but that did not mean the end of Destruction, simply that he no longer controls it, or takes a part in what happens to mortals. He says that the Endless are, in a way, simply patterns and ideas that despite lasting billions of years, will end as well. He seems to be one of the more rational and least cryptic of the Endless, rivalling Death for simply telling the truth as he sees it, like calling Morpheus a romantic fool straight to his face. It was also satisfying that the whole adventure forced Morpheus to talk to his son, and grant him the death he desired. While it was undoubtedly a relief for Orpheus, Morpheus ends the book mourning the son he lost a long time ago. Despite his own resistance to change, Morpheus is told by several of his siblings, and his son, that he has changed greatly over the centuries, mostly since his imprisonment.

In some ways this volume answered a lot of questions I had, but in other ways it just made more. It is implied that Delirium is not the only Endless who 'changed' and that at one point one of the Endless fell, and Despair took their place. Like all of the Sandman books, there is more than one story taking place. Delirium and Morpheus' quest is one. There is also the exploration of what happens to powerful ideas like gods, how they change to expand, or fade, or die. The is also the notion of how strong ideas can still have power in mysterious ways.