Neil Gaiman’s ‘American Gods’ to Become a TV Show in 2013

So, if you haven’t read Neil Gaiman’s book American Gods, go do it right now. Immediately. I don’t care if you’re working, checking e-mail or bare-ass naked, you get up, get your hands on a copy and read that book this instant.

Okay, okay, maybe it’s not so important that you can’t finish up at work and maybe put some pants on, but here’s the point: American Gods is an amazing book. And now, it’s going to be a television series.

HBO is planning a six-season series based on the novel, starting in 2013. The series will bring to screen the premise that gods are real, all of ’em, and that America is probably the worst place in the world for them to exist. It’s a bit more complicated than that, really, but that’s the general idea.

Though the current American Gods mythology only contains one book and a short story that followed it up (Neil Gaiman has said that while Anansi Boys shares characters and themes with American Gods, he doesn’t consider it a sequel…oh and by the way, add Anansi Boys to your “to read” list, too), Gaiman has assured fans that the series will not just follow the plot of the first book, in fact, on Twitter he stated “And for those asking, No, 6 years of AMERICAN GODS on TV doesn’t mean just the 1st book. It means I need to write the 2nd now, for a start.”

Wait, the TV show means I get more books? This is the best deal ever.

Have you read American Gods? Are you looking forward to the series? Am the only person who would love to see Dwayne Johnson play Shadow?