My feelings about THE SLEEPER AND THE SPINDLE are a little odd. As other reviewers noted, I came to it expecting a lesbian love story with gorgeous art. It is not.

The actual book does feature deadly beautiful art, which I really, really loved. It's seriously worth buying a copy just for the Riddell's work. The story, however, is classic Gaiman, while my brain was somehow expecting a more straightforward tale. There's an encroaching creeping dark, humorous characters with mysterious pasts, and also--and here's the disappointing part for me--a stunning plot twist at the very end, reminiscent of NEVERWHERE. The plot twist chucks a hugerific boulder at any illusions of a happy ending. I wanted a happy ending. Happy lesbains make me happy. To be fair, there's still LGBTQIA characters, even significant subtext that Snow White might be aromantic and/or asexual, but the ending is more "and then we struggled on" than "and they lived happily ever after."

Do I regret reading? Nope. But once again, my expectations of a book messed up my actual experience reading.

Like many, I received this as part of the Humble Bundle of Gaiman rarities. A super quick read, it contains a writings relevant to the Stardust universe, including a prologue and 3 poems. A lovely little gem with lovely stylized art!