I picked up this book at the local library because of two men: Neil Gaiman and John Constantine. They did not disappoint.

The main question posited by the book was that, given how magic works/cost, is it worth it? On the one hand, it's /magic/ and like come on, way cool. On the other hand, it's dangerous, deceptive, and costly. I thought the book was tipped a little negatively towards magic, but I loved thinking this is what Gaiman thought on the subject. I'm not as brief on the DC universe as the Marvel one, but the story brought me up to speed nicely AND there were cameos of my favorite Endless. Another review called the art style "smears of impressionism" and that is exactly right. Lovely, spotty, and magical.

My other thought strain was about the protag being a young white man. Gaiman really tries to be diverse in his other works, so I thought the protag choice odd since small white man doing magic is very cliche and if you don't believe me, Tim Hunter's Trenchcoat Brigade is entirely white men. Then I realized: only a young white man would think himself safe enough to go off on adventures with older white men in trenchcoats. If the Trenchcoat Brigade approached young girl Natalie, I would scream about stranger danger and run because I was aware at the age of 8 that I had to protect myself. Now, if the Trenchcoat Brigade came in the form of a bunch of Girl Scout camp moms, that'd be another story, but Gaiman used, or had to use, actual DC characters.

*happy sigh* Gaiman is quite the loveliest write. Every word is a spell in this one.