Selections from Fragile Things, Volume One (ePub)

The marvelous creations found in Fragile Things showcase the unparalleled invention and storytelling brilliance—as well as the terrifyingly dark and entertaining sense of humor—of the incomparable Neil Gaiman. By turns delightful, disturbing, and diverting, Fragile Things is a gift of literary enchantment from one of the most original writers of our time.

In Selections from Fragile Things, Volume 1 you will find the following stories and poems, sure to thrill and amaze.

Introduction
Arguably the only thing more intriguing than a Neil Gaiman story is a look into his mind as he creates one. In his introduction to Fragile Things, Gaiman gives us a glimpse of the creative cogs turning behind each story in his collection with notes on his inspirations and intent. Also found in the introduction is The Mapmaker, a fable about a map-hungry emperor, omitted from Gaiman's bestseller American Gods.

A Study in Emerald
Prince Franz Drago of Bohemia has been murdered, his green blood splashed across the wallpaper of a seedy London apartment. Our narrator's distinguished and mysterious friend is on the case from his headquarters on Baker Street. Though his friend is a master of deduction and disguise, this is not Sherlock Holmes' Baker Street, or really an earthly Baker Street at all.

The Fairy Reel
At Gaiman's suggestion, read this poem aloud, but be careful not to let the Fairy Reel tug a piece of your soul away in the process.

October in the Chair
Buoyed by an inflated ego and pencil-thin moustache, September takes the stage at a meeting of the months, only to be asked to step down by a rotund August who claims his story is a repeat. A bearded October, chair of the meeting, salvages the meeting with a story about a runaway, a ghost, and an abandoned farmhouse “darker than anything.”