A slightly twee-take on Alice Cooper and his Steven persona.

Gaiman claims he deliberately pulled back from making the narrative too complex or ambitious, but then he's put out some truly putrid material like the nauseatingly cutesy Graveyard Book.

Alice Cooper on the other hand has produced some of the darkest mainstream rock albums ever released. So I'm having a hard time taking Gaiman's word for it.

For the hardcore AC fan, this is a pretty good read - think an Alice Cooperified version of The Christmas Carol set in Halloween. Also, the hardcoire Gaiman completist is likely to get a kick out of it, especially because of certain...cameos.

But beyond those demographics, I'd be hard pressed to think of anyone who would be interested in this.

This is one I can appreciate but that I didn't really enjoy. Most of the supposed creepiness is really just goriness, and I've never been a fan of that, but the drawings are impressive. The story is just meh, which hurts me to say since I'm a big fan of Gaiman, but I guess no one is going to love every artist's offering.

Just like many of his other books, the story revolves around a juveline chAracter who is offered immortality-the chance to never grow old by the mysterious showman.

Great to be read in graphic novel version!

**Resubida por nuevo usuario

Soy fan de Alice Cooper y este libro venia ad hoc leerlo.
La historia se me hace conocida o es muy cliché. Sobre un adolescente miedoso, un villano, romance y desenlace. Se parece bastante al comic "La verdad sobre el caso de la desaparición de la Srta. Finch" del mismo autor.
Me encantó las ilustraciones, son bastantes perturbadores algunas. Mi parte favorita fue cuando Alice Cooper se transforma en las personas que Steven va conversando en su día a día.

Musical summary of the book:

https://youtu.be/fO0Lpk1fh3g

:')

A good ol fashion yarn in the vein of Something Wicked This Way Comes and October Country. Gaiman clearly references Bradbury throughout the text and it's a wonderful, if albeit, brief introduction into a new semi-fictional world.
If you enjoyed Over the Garden Wall, you'll be sure to enjoy this.
I was entertained throughout and the art is memorable with clean lines and moody atmosphere. The best concept album, comic that I've ever read.

Soy fan de Alice Cooper y este libro venia ad hoc leerlo.
La historia se me hace conocida o es muy cliché. Sobre un adolescente miedoso, un villano, romance y desenlace. Se parece bastante al comic "La verdad sobre el caso de la desaparición de la Srta. Finch" del mismo autor.
Me encantó las ilustraciones, son bastantes perturbadores algunas. Mi parte favorita fue cuando Alice Cooper se transforma en las personas que Steven va conversando en su día a día.

I've never really been a fan of Alice Cooper, or KISS, or any of those clown acts. Alice and Neil apparently got together to cook up an idea for a concept album (which I should have been playing while reading this, but see above) and graphic novel which has the theme and flavor of much of Gaiman's children's horror work: You're a fearful kid, you need to face those fears. Our hero, a fearful kid, goes to a show for one with Alice Cooper as a main character, and this continuingly scary experience bleeds into his every day life.

The story is largely forgettable, actually, but the art by Michael Zulli is pretty spectacular, and now, in this twentieth year edition, gloriously colored. And when you get Gaiman, you get master artist Dave McKean's covers, which are always amazing. This is a deluxe edition, so you also get letters between Alice and Neil (but see above, eh) and scripts and pre-colored sketches. This is better than the original and a nice package, but eh, read The Graveyard Book or Coraline or The Ocean at the End of the Lane if you want Gaiman kid horror.

This review originally published in Looking For a Good Book. Rated 2.5 of 5

Neil Gaiman has the Midas touch when it comes to anything in the publishing industry, graphic novels in particular.  Of course he's earned that through hard work and awesome writing.  But even Midas had his early years.

I really respect Gaiman's work, though I wouldn't count myself among his most ardent fans (perhaps because I haven't read every word he's written) and I wouldn't consider myself a fan of the music of Alice Cooper by any means (though who can't sing the refrain to "School's Out"?).  Yet I can see where the two might go hand in hand.

The partnership appears to have been instigated by Alice Cooper, and Gaiman, early in his career (this is a 20th Anniversary Edition), was accommodating.  The sense of Gaiman's story-telling is obvious.  The magic.  The sense of a reality beyond what the average person sees is very much in evidence.  The use of a child, or young teen, is very much in evidence.  As is the swirling dark, magical world that would appeal to fans of Gaiman and Cooper both.

What there isn't, is much of a story.  This is 100 pages of figurative trick-or-treating.  A Showman (Cooper) trying to trick a youngster (though there really is no reason for it), who turns the tables, but is never the victor.  Does this make sense?  It doesn't need to.  It's really all about Alice Cooper appearing in a comic book/graphic novel and Neil Gaiman getting to play in his fantastic world.  For these two things, this book works.  For a good, strong story?  not so much.

The art is broodingly dark and appropriate though not always clear.  The youths are not drawn as sharp and as consistently as the rest of the characters or scenery.  But the opening panels of autumn leaves and the crow are outstanding and really prepared me for an awesome work.

I would like to have liked this a little more.  It's certainly interesting from a Neil Gaiman retrospective standpoint, but not so much as a current work.  This reissued, deluxe edition includes a copy of Gaiman's 'original outline' for the story, and about 40 pages of script for the book.  Interesting, but every other graphic novel is doing this and it no longer seems like much of a bonus but an expected part of the experience.

Looking for a good book?  Neil Gaiman fans and Alice Cooper fans might really enjoy the chance to read this book, The Last Temptation, but it's not a particularly strong story on its own.

I love Neil Gaiman and Alice Cooper. Put the two of them together, and I'm sure to love the finished product....right?

Well, yes. Yes, I did. The Last Temptation was an unusual piece, short, sweet, and to the general allegorical point. It was just the right amount of creepy with a pinch of morality. It was a fun and easy read.

My only complaint was that I wished it was a bit longer. With more space to expand, it could have been a lot richer and more detailed. And I think that would have been a positive boon for the book as a whole. However, there's always the concern that adding too much is overkill. And perhaps, in a case like this, more plot might have bogged the sweetly haunting storyline down into something less ethereal, less ghostly, and less haunting. Bravo, Gaiman and Cooper. Bravo.

Una fiesta macabra para fans de cualquiera de los tres creadores.

I quite enjoyed this story. Definitely for fans of Gaiman and Cooper.