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| The Graveyard Book | 
 enlarge | Author: Neil Gaiman
Creator: Dave Mckean
Publisher: HarperCollins
Category: Book
List Price: $17.99
Buy New: $10.69
You Save: $7.30 (41%)
New (6) Used (3) from $10.69
Avg. Customer Rating:  10 reviews
Sales Rank: 31
Media: Hardcover
Reading Level: Ages 9-12
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 8.2 x 5.7 x 0.8
ISBN: 0060530928
EAN: 9780060530921
ASIN: 0060530928
Publication Date: October 1, 2008 (New: This Week)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
Nobody Owens, known to his friends as Bod, is a normal boy. He would be completely normal if he didn't live in a sprawling graveyard, being raised and educated by ghosts, with a solitary guardian who belongs to neither the world of the living nor of the dead. There are dangers and adventures in the graveyard for a boy-an ancient Indigo Man beneath the hill, a gateway to a desert leading to an abandoned city of ghouls, the strange and terrible menace of the Sleer. But if Bod leaves the graveyard, then he will come under attack from the man Jack—who has already killed Bod's family. . . . Beloved master storyteller Neil Gaiman returns with a luminous new novel for the audience that embraced his New York Times bestselling modern classic coraline. Magical, terrifying, and filled with breathtaking adventures, the graveyard book is sure to enthrall readers of all ages.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 5 more reviews...
Gaiman riffs on Kipling's Jungle Book September 30, 2008
14 out of 16 found this review helpful
Gaiman's latest finds the popular author channeling Rudyard Kipling's 1894 story collection The Jungle Book, particularly the story of the boy, Mowgli, who was raised in the jungle by animals, specifically by his mentors, Baloo the bear, Kaa the snake, and Bagheera, the panther. As indicated by its title, Gaiman's take on the story involves a boy who is raised by the denizens of a graveyard.
Like many ideas he's developed, it is one that occurred to Gaiman a long way back, and stayed with him over the years. In the author's own words:
"Around 1985 or 1986, we lived in a house with no garden, but we had a graveyard just over the run, so that was where my son Michael (three or four at the time) rode his little tricycle. And I remember watching him, and thinking it would be fun to do The Jungle Book, only set in a graveyard instead of a jungle, and that was the start of it. Because I tend to be fairly slow about these things, it's taken me...twenty-two years to get to it."
The first half of Chapter One (which I was fortunate enough to hear Gaiman read aloud at a November, 2007 gathering at the University of Minnesota) describes how a man named Jack enters a house and kills its occupants, except for an infant, a boy, who manages to escape the killing zone and ends up in a nearby graveyard. There, the denizens of the graveyard reach a momentous decision, deciding to raise the toddler as a member of their extended family. After much humorous and heated debate, they name him Nobody, because he's like nobody else in the cemetery. Bod, as he comes to be known, is still in danger, however, as Jack (like the lethal and murderous tiger Shere Khan in The Jungle Book) is still looking for him, hoping to finish his task of eliminating the members of Bod's family.
That's the setup; to discuss subsequent chapters in any detail would be a disservice to Gaiman's constant readers. Suffice it to say all the praise lavished on the author in the blurbs above is justified: Gaiman deftly blends action, humor, horror, and a good deal of, well, humanity, into a suspenseful storyline, offsetting the grim goings on with a cast of irrepressible characters sure to strike a favorable chord with readers. Always an interesting, inventive, and intuitive storyteller, Gaiman has outdone himself with The Graveyard Book, creating a tale destined to be well received both critically and commercially. This one might have taken twenty-two years to finish, but it has proven to be well worth the wait.
Gaiman's Kind of People September 30, 2008
5 out of 8 found this review helpful
So, okay, I admit it. Like untold others, I'm a Neil Gaiman fan. The man is nice (I've had drinks with him not that he'd remember), has a vivid imagination, and writes a remarkable variety of things -- comics, poems, essays, screenplays, adult fantasy, picture books, and kid books -- all quite well. So when he began documenting the progress of writing this book I was very curious to read it. Based on what else of his I'd read (notably Coraline which I love to read aloud), I expected chills, darkness, and humor. The Graveyard Book has all of that, but it also has something I wasn't expecting -- a remarkable tenderness and sweet sadness that made it one of the best things of Gaiman's I've ever read.
This is the story of Bod, short for Nobody, a child being raised by a bevy of graveyard inhabitants. Brought there as a baby, Bod, is nurtured by the warm and affectionate Mr. and Mrs. Owens, supervised by the serious Silus, and taught by many others in this unique and lovely community of ghosts and other such beings. Bod has adventures, makes special friends (not all from within the graveyard or fantasy world), and begins to learn about his past and future.
The story has the feeling of Kipling's Mowgli stories from The Jungle Books -- favorites of mine growing up. Silus resembles Bagheera for me; while I'm not so sure if there are others that can be so easily compared a similar charm, humor, warmth, and originality are in both. And most of all, both involve a boy brought to a completely different world and raised lovingly and carefully by the inhabitants of that world.
One of my favorite chapters in the book is "The Hounds of God." Silus brings a Miss Lupescu to the graveyard to instruct and feed Bod while he is off on a trip. Having already been taught by graveyard inhabitants Letitia Borrows and Mr. Pennyworth ("Compleat Educational System for Younger Gentlemen with Additional Material for those Post Mortem"), Bod doesn't see the need for new teachers. Miss Lupescu quickly proves otherwise.
"Name the different kinds of people," said Miss Lupescu. "Now."
Bod thought for a moment. "The living, " he said. "Er. The dead." he stopped. Then, "...Cats? he offered, uncertainly.
Missing Silus and definitely not enjoying either Miss Lupescu's lessons or cooking, when three strange creatures show up calling themselves the Duke of Westminster, the Honorable Archibald Fitzhugh, and the Bishop of Bath and Wells, Bod eagerly takes off with them. The resulting adventure turns out to be wilder and harsher and more remarkable than he or the reader would expect. Funny, scary, and exciting all at once.
So is the whole book. As well as elegant, gentle, witty, pensive, and moving.
 Gaiman Does It Again! September 30, 2008
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
Nei Gaiman's imagination is extraordinary. His stories are always full of wit and humor. They are always entertaining. The Graveyard Book is no exception. Although it is being sold as a young adult novel, The Graveyard Book should please adults and youths alike.
After his family is murdered, young Bod (short for Nobody) finds himself in a cemetery, one that is inhabited by a colony of ghosts. After one dies, he remains forever in the place in which he is buried. To protect him from the murderer, young Bod is adopted by a ghostly couple who always wanted children. They will try to raise a human child as their own.
As Bod grows up, he encounters various ghostly characters, all the while wondering what life outside the cemetery would be like. But his family's murderer is still on the loose and, soon enough, he comes back to get him. He also learns to use their powers; fade to nothingness, walk through walls...
For every dark moment in this book, there is also a very funny one. Each chapter feels like a short story, a new adventure that Bod partakes in. In one chapter, he meets a young human girl that will soon become a long lost friend. In another, he is witness to the ghostly celebration that only happens once in a blue moon. In another, he is taken hostage by strange creatures and taken to a parallel world. In another, he meets ancient crypt keepers that are protecting a hidden treasure. The book never ceases to amaze or surprise.
Every page is drowned in Gaiman's wit, humor and sarcasm. It's rare that I can read a book where something makes me smile on every page. And although this is supposed to be a young adult novel, I had a great time reading it. I couldn't put it down. This book is in the same vein as Gaiman's Stardust; the kind of story that everyone can enjoy. A real gem. The only thing I wished for is more. I hope Gaiman revisits these characters one day soon!
The gravity of the situation October 4, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I've noticed that there's been an increased interest in the macabre in children's literature lately. Sometimes when I've had a glass or two of wine and I'm in a contemplative mood I try weaving together a postulation that ties the current love of violent movies into this rise in children's literary darkness. Is the violence of the world today trickling down into our entertainment? Hogwash and poppycock and other words of scoff and denial, says sober I. But I've certainly seen a distinct rise in the Gothic and otherworldly over the last few years, and one wonders if it's because kids want more of that kind of stuff or publishers are merely getting less squeamish. All that aside, generally I'll read a May Bird book or an Everlost title and they'll be fun examinations of the hereafter, but not the kind of things that touch my heart. Great writing doesn't have to transcend its genre. It just has to be emotionally honest with the reader. And The Graveyard Book is one of the most emotionally honest books I've yet to have read this year. Smart and focused, touching and wry, it takes the story of a boy raised by ghosts and extends it beyond the restrictive borders of the setting. Great stuff.
It starts with three murders. There were supposed to be four. The man Jack was one of the best, maybe THE best, and how hard is it to kill a toddler anyway? But on that particular night the little boy went for a midnight toddle out the front door while the murderer was busy and straight into the nearby graveyard. Saved and protected by the denizens of that particular abode (the ghosts and the far more corporeal if mysterious Silas), the little boy is called Bod, short for Nobody because no one knows his name. As he grows older, Bod learns the secrets of the graveyard, though he has to be careful. The man (or is it "men"?) who killed his family could come back for him. Best to stay quiet and out of sight. Yet as Bod grows older it becomes clear that hiding may not be the best way to confront his enemies. And what's more, Bod must come to grips with what it means to grow up.
Can I level with you? You know Coraline? Mr. Gaiman's previous foray into middle grade children's literature. Come close now, I don't want to speak too loudly. Uh... I didn't much care for it. WAIT! Come back, come back, I didn't mean it! Well, maybe I did a tad. It was a nice book. A sufficient story. But it was very much (new category alert) an adult-author-to-children's-author-first-timer-title. Gaiman appeared to be finding his sealegs with Coraline. He took the old Alice in Wonderland trope which adult authors naturally gravitate to on their first tries (see: Un Lun Dun, Summerland, The King in the Window, etc.). Throw in some rats, bees, and buttons, and voila! Instant success. But Coraline for all its readability and charm didn't get me here [thumps chest:]. I didn't feel emotionally close to the material. Now why it should be that I'd feel closer emotionally to a book filled with a plethora of ghosts, ghouls, night-gaunts, and Hounds of God, I can only chalk up to The Graveyard Book's strong vision.
My husband likes to say that the whole reason Buffy the Vampire Slayer worked as a television show was that it was a natural metaphor for the high school (and eventually college) experience. Likewise, The Graveyard Book has this strong,strange, wonderful metaphor about kids growing up, learning about the wider world, and exploring beyond the safe boundaries of their homes. There's so much you can read into this book. I mean, aren't all adults just ghosts to kids anyway? Those funny talking people whose time has passed but that may provide some shelter and wisdom against the wider, crueler world. Plus Mr. Gaiman also includes characters in Bod's world that kids will wish they had in their own. Silas, a man who may be a vampire (though the word is never said) is every child's fantasy; A mysterious/magical guardian/friend who will tell you the truth when your parents will not.
One thing I particularly liked about the book was the fact that Bod makes quite a few careless or thoughtless mistakes and yet you don't feel particularly inclined to throttle him because of them. Too often in a work of fiction a person isn't properly put into the head of their protagonist. So when that character walks off and does something stupid there's the sense (sometimes faint, sometimes not) that they deserved it and you're not going to stick around and read about somebody that dumb, are you? But even when Bod is at his most intolerable, his most childishly selfish and single-minded, you can understand and sympathize with him. Bod is no brat, a fact that implies right there that he is someone worth rooting for. We see our own young selves in Bod, and we root for him as a result. And as Bod reaches each stage in his growth, he encounters experiences and personalities that help him to reach maturity. That's a lot to put on the plate of a l'il ole fantasy novel, particularly one that's appropriate for younger kids.
And it is appropriate too. Don't let the fact that the first sentence in the book ("There was a hand in the darkness, and it held a knife") put you off. The murder of Bod's family is swift, immediate, and off-screen. What remains is just a great fantasy novel that has the potential to appeal to both boy and girl readers. Kid wants a ghost story? Check. Kid wants a fantasy novel set in another world appropriate for Harry Potter fans? Check. Kid wants a "good book". That's my favorite request. When the eleven-year-old comes up to my desk and begs for "a good book" I can just show them the cover and the title of this puppy and feel zero guilt when their little eyes light up. A good book it is.
I guess that if I have any objections at all to the title it has something to do with the villains. They're a bit sketchy, which I suppose is the point, but we live in an era where children's fantasy novels spend oodles of time defining their antagonists' motivations and histories. Gaiman's more interested in his hero, which is natural, but the villains' raison d'etre is just a bit too vague for the average reader. Honestly, if it weren't for the fact that Bod's family is slaughtered at the start of this tale you wouldn't necessarily know whether or not to believe that these people are as nasty as we've been told.
That said the book's a peach. I once heard someone postulate that maybe Neil Gaiman wrote it just so that he could play with the sentence "It takes a graveyard to raise a child." Unlikely. Fun, but unlikely. I mean, he does make a casual allusion that isn't far off from that phrase, but he never goes whole hog. This book doesn't feel like it was written to back up a joke. It feels like a book written by a parent with children growing up and moving out. It's a title that tips its hat to kids making their way in the world, their pasts behind them, their futures unknown. This is not yet another silly little fantasy novel, but something with weight and depth. The fact that it just happens to be loads of fun to boot is simply a nice bonus. Highly recommended.
Kipling's Jungle Book in Ray Bradbury's October Country October 4, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The Ray Bradbury link is no accident: Neil Gaiman himself has talked about how Bradbury's work has deeply influenced him, and it was in the Bradbury-esquely titled "M is for Magic" that I first encountered Bod Owens, in "The Witch's Headstone". I don't think there is any other writer today, besides Neil Gaiman, whose stories can evoke that place of mystery and shivery wonder that Bradbury dubbed the October Country, and this book takes you right into the heart of it. The book reminds me very much of Bradbury's "From the Dust Returned" (both feature a young boy living among odd, supernatural beings), but the story is more linear and concrete and Gaiman approaches it with his usual practical magical realism. And in developing Bod's journey to full self-awareness of this place in the world, Gaiman delved into Kipling's classic "Jungle Books", specifically the stories of Mowgli the wolf-boy, one of my childhood favorite books. Like Mowgli, Bod loses his family in a shiveringly off-screen murder, but the killer, known initially only as "Jack" is far more of a monster than Kipling's lame, cowardly tiger Shere Khan. A Victorian couple of ghosts known as the Owenses take in Bod when he wanders into the graveyard, much as Mowgli was taken in by Father Wolf and his mate Raksha when he wandered into the mouth of their cave, and he is tutored by the mysterious Silas, who may or may not be a vampire, but who mirrors the dangerous stateliness of Bagheera, Mowgli's black panther mentor. And the ghouls that capture Bod are a gleefully gruesome riff on the band of monkeys that capture Mowgli. But beyond that, a mysterious lady in grey riding a white horse appears toward the beginning and the end (a beginning in itself...), who more than slightly resembles Death, from Neil Gaiman's own Sandman comics...
I could say trite things about this being the sort of book that kids and adults will both enjoy in different ways, and reading it will keep you up all night in a good way, but these definately fall short in describing the wonders of this newest offering from a master of fantasy
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