Neil Gaiman announces Neverwhere sequel

Neil Gaiman, whose latest book Norse Mythology is set to top the bestseller lists this weekend, has announced his next project: the sequel to another hit, Neverwhere, more than 20 years after it was first published, the Guardian reports.

Neverwhere tells the story of Richard Mayhew, an ordinary young man drawn into the fantastical landscape of London Below, an otherworldly city populated by real landmarks and legends personified, including the Old Bailey, the Black Friars and the Angel, Islington – among which the lost, homeless and dispossessed of London move. The idea came from a chat with Gaiman’s friend, the comedian and actor Lenny Henry, who suggested the concept of tribes of homeless people living beyond the notice of “ordinary” people in London.

The Neverwhere story is perhaps Gaiman’s most various work. Beginning life as a BBC TV series in 1996, Gaiman released a novelisation of his own script later that same year. In 2005, it was turned into a comic book by writer Mike Carey and artist Glenn Fabry and in 2013, a BBC radio adaptation with Dirk Maggs at the tiller was broadcast. The story has also been adapted for the stage several times.