The Absolute Sandman, Vol. 1

There are some differences between this and the trade (or paperback) version that I noticed right away:- The title pages for each "volume" don't have the text on them (which I miss).- Not all the spreads line up the way they do in the paperback versions, but all the spreads that were meant to be together are likely intact.- The absolute sandman contains the recolored art which I thought would be awesome but I'm weirdly loyal to the original coloring now that I see them together. In the original coloring, Dream's hair and clothes have blue shadows, but in the recolor his hair has gray shadows which just doesn't look the same.It's not an easy book to physically read because it's huge and heavy, but it's beautiful and appears to be well made. It's nice to have the extra page space for all the beautiful art.Until now I've been borrowing the paperbacks volume by volume from the library and got tired of waiting. This seemed like the best balance between the most economical and most high quality way to experience the full series.

I am completely geeked out over this super-awesome tome. It's huge, heavy, thick, and has that great new-book smell. It's leather bound, features high-quality, glossy paper, and comes in a sturdy cardboard slip-cover. It's a beautiful book that's built to last, and it damn well better be with a cover price of $99.00.The Sandman is the respected, literary-minded, award-winning comic book series that ran 75 issues from the late 80's to mid 90's. Absolute Sandman, Vol. 1 collects the first twenty issues, the first eighteen of which have been completely re-colored. Three more volumes are to follow that will collect the rest of the series.Sandman is the first major project by Neil Gaiman, who has become well-known for his best-selling novels, including American Gods and Anansi Boys. The story follows Dream of the Endless, also known as Morpheus and the Sandman, a powerful entity who rules the Realm of Dreams. Gaiman blends history, classic legends and myth, religion, philosophy, fantasy, comedy, horror, and drama to weave his epic tale. The story takes us all over the world we know, in times both past and present. We also travel within the many realms of Dream, shifting places shaped both by Morpheus and our own subconcious minds. Briefly, we visit other realms as well, such as Faerie and even Hell itself.If you enjoy dark fantasy, horror, or just heart-felt human drama, you do yourself a disservice by not checking out Sandman. This book is beautiful but pricey (although it's a lot cheaper on Amazon.com). The story is available in smaller collections that are much more affordable.In short, read Sandman... you won't be sorry.

I don't know if you have ever read anything of Neil Gaiman... you'll like him for sure if you like comics like Alan Moore's ones, in my opinion.Anyway...Anything I have read of Neil Gaiman(a little of his production by now) shows how profound is his knowledge of mithology.In "Sandman" (but quite the same can be said about American Gods, one of his novels) he founds a new Pantheon that comprehends gods from various and distant cultures."Sandman" is the tale of Dream (the Sandman, Morpheus, Oneiros...he has actually quite a few names!), one of the Endless. Dream is a principle, but he is also anthropomorphic, and for this reason he loves, hates and feels the passion of the humans.The other Endless are Destiny, Death, the twins Desire and Desperation, Delirium and Destruction. They are more than Gods, and they have always been and will be there till the end of time.As the story of Dream develops, he grows more conscious of his function and learns from his sister Death how indissolubly he and the other Endless are linked with the ones they rule, being both their kings and their servants.This is the main theme of the comic, but there are a lot of stories inside it, all linked magistrally by the author. We understand why cats are our pets and not vice versa, we are spectator of the Midsummer Night Dream with Oberon and Titania, and we understand how great is the power of dreams, them being able to change the world we live in.Sandman is really much more than this, but I have some difficulties with English (I am Italian, had to buy it in English 'cause in my country it is absolutely impossible to find), so I find it hard to explain all of the infinite implications this wonderful story has and I doubt I have understood them all, either! My apologies...Hope I've convinced you enough to read it and then let me know what you think about it. :)

I am very happy with this volume; I plan on getting the whole set, plus probably some of the related work (i.e. Absolute Death).The Sandman stories and artwork are classic. I don't know why this isn't required reading, really, it's all so solid.This edition is oversized, recolored, and contains extras (examples of early concept art, scripts, etc.)... all worth it in my opinion. It also comes in a slipcase. I read some other reviews that the binding was no good but I haven't had any issues with it.