Reading spurt before 2020 ends

I've been falling behind on my reading challenge on Goodreads this year so figured I'd do a spurt consisting mostly of comics to finish the year on top. Here's what I've read:

1. The DC Universe by Neil Gaiman. This is a compilation of the DC comics written by Gaiman. I am a Marvel girl at heart, but I've always had a soft spot for Batman simply because his universe is so damned detailed. I love it. So out of the stories in this compilation my favourite has to be the final one Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader, but I also really enjoyed the Penguin origin story and the little tidbit called A Black and White World where they pretend that the Batman and the Joker are just characters played by people and they're complaining about the daily grind while acting out their scenes. That was a pretty neat spin that I really liked.

2. Cinnamon, by Neil Gaiman. One of his most recent teeny tiny children's books. I rarely read children's books for small children, save for when Gaiman writes them, because I love his ability to fit lots of story into small spaces. My favourite is still The Wolves in the Walls, but Cinnamon was very sweet. I just wish there was more to her story so I'm hoping we'll get more Cinnamon at some point. Like we got more Chu. Pretty pictures, sweet story. Definitely a thumbs up. 

3. Odd and the Frost Giants, by Neil Gaiman. I've been putting off reading this for so long and I don't know why. Guess the cover didn't really call to me or something. But I finally did and I loved it. I loved the spin on the Norse mythology and I loved how Chris Riddell almost certainly was inspired by John Bauer's trolls for the Frost Giants. It's also very fitting reading this now when I only recently finished playing Assassin's Creed Valhalla and my head is stuffed full of Viking stuff. This story was just really my speed at the moment. It's a classic fairytale of talking animals and gods and magic and happy endings, but it also has all the adult hints that children's stories usually do about love and alcohol and wanting things you can't have even though you're old enough. I could definitely read this over and over again.

4. A Study in Emerald, by Neil Gaiman. Sherlock Holmes meets Lovecraftian horror and it's brilliantly done. It starts out as the first Sherlock Holmes story; A Study in Red, but soon turns Lovecraftian as it becomes obvious that it's common knowledge that all the royals of the world have green blood. A few pages more and it's obvious that the ones they call the royals are in fact the Old Ones who returned from the deep 700 years earlier. This is absolutely brilliant and incredibly well done. And that twist at the end? Wonderful.

And I still didn't manage to complete my reading challenge for 2020. I fell short on three books.