Neil Gaiman’s perennial favorite, The Graveyard Book, has sold more than one million copies and is the only novel to win both the Newbery Medal and the Carnegie Medal. Bod is an unusual boy who inhabits an unusual place—he’s the only living resident of a graveyard. Raised from infancy by the ghosts, werewolves, and other cemetery denizens, Bod has learned the antiquated customs of his guardians’ … antiquated customs of his guardians’ time as well as their ghostly teachings—such as the ability to Fade so mere mortals cannot see him.
Can a boy raised by ghosts face the wonders and terrors of the worlds of both the living and the dead?
The Graveyard Book is the winner of the Newbery Medal, the Carnegie Medal, the Hugo Award for best novel, the Locus Award for Young Adult novel, the American Bookseller Association’s “Best Indie Young Adult Buzz Book,” a Horn Book Honor, and Audio Book of the Year. Don’t miss this modern classic—whether shared as a read-aloud or read independently, it’s sure to appeal to readers ages 8 and up.
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“Small boy being raised lovingly by true monsters” is a fantastically cheeky premise of the sort that very few authors can pull off well. Neil Gaiman will always be one of those authors.
This book is one of my all time favorites. It’s simply magical.
I read this to my sixth-grade class and they were absolutely enthralled, checking it out for themselves once we were done.
A fascinating tale about life after death and life before death.
Quirky, funny, excellece in story telling. Gaiman does it again…
I always love the powerful lyrical quality of Gaiman’s writing. Although a simple story, the Graveyard Book packs quite a punch.
I take notes while I read, little phrases that jump out at me. Then I use those notes to write reviews. I’ve come to the conclusion that the fewer notes I write, the better the book.
With some books, I’m setting it aside every few minutes to jot down a note about something or other that tripped me up or threw me out of the story. Simple enough since this naturally happens when the story isn’t holding my attention. Then there are times when I get to the end of a book and find I’ve written no notes at all, or perhaps just a very few and all within the first few pages of the story. These are the books that receive five stars.
The Graveyard Book had exactly three notes in its file. These were:
1- Excellent descriptions. Just the right amount of information to keep me engaged without breaking the flow.
2- A little strange to have the narrator address me directly, but only because so few books do that lately. It was done well and not overly distracting.
3- Some odd perspective shifts, and a few patches of confusing language that tripped me up.
That’s it. I read to the end of the book without ever stopping to write another note. This tells me the flow of the story, the pacing, the tension were all top notch. When I set the book down I was eager to pick it up again. When I got to the end I was satisfied but sad, the mix of emotions I’ve come to equate with a good story, and so I say to Mr. Gaiman, “Well done.”
EVen thought his book is for middle schoolers, I thoroughly enjoyed it!
Bod is a great character and the atmosphere is spooky and eerie but not too much.
Loved it
I adored this story.
Loved the way Gaimen takes something that seems “obvious” and sort of tilts it sideways. Great imaginative story! Read it as an adult and loved it!
Gaimen at his best.
I love it. I’ve read it at least 3 times.
Neil Gaiman’s made a living by playing with our notions of how things work.
In American Gods, he asked what would happen if the people of Earth created gods by believing in them… and then forgot them. In Neverwhere, he toyed with the idea of London Below, a subterranean community beneath the oblivious London Above. And in The Graveyard Book (the third novel of Gaiman’s I’ve read), he dabbles in another hidden world: the afterlife.
The notion this time is that when you die, you live on as a ghost in the graveyard where you’re buried. People from different eras thus haunt the same patch of land for eons. And in the case of a particular cemetery in contemporary England, that means Celts mingle with Romans, Victorians, and the odd vampire.
Into this ghoulish mix stumbles a toddler, a boy whose parents and sister have just been murdered. The ghosts of the graveyard decide to adopt and protect the child, and he grows up there with the name Bod (short for Nobody) Owens. He doesn’t get much of a traditional education, but his spectral benefactors teach him the tricks of the dead: passing through walls, fading into darkness, etc. But Bod can’t stray far from the graveyard, because the man who killed his family wants to finish the job by killing him too.
As usual, Gaiman tells his tale with whimsy and heart. And since The Graveyard Book is written for children, the story is extra charming—who doesn’t want to root for an orphan with fun powers? I found the first few chapters a little slow, though. Young Bod isn’t capable of addressing the central problem (how to avenge his family), so Gaiman takes him on a series of seemingly unrelated adventures in the graveyard. This issue of agency persists when teenage Bod is finally ready to take on his pursuer; by confining Bod to the graveyard, Gaiman prevents his protagonist from taking the fight to the assassin. Instead, it’s the assassin who finds a way to get to Bod.
But I liked the story overall. Those early adventures plant the seeds for the story’s resolution, and as Gaiman notes in his afterword, the ending serves as an allegory for how parents eventually have to let their children go (or, for young readers, how they eventually have to step out on their own). In other words, The Graveyard Book is a touching example of how fiction can help us navigate reality. I hope my daughter reads it one day.
When she’s old enough.
(For more reviews like this one, see http://www.nickwisseman.com)
I am still reading but so far I can’t get enough! I love the characters and they keep getting better. Though its about a boy named Bod, I think he is a great character.
Neil Gaiman for kids is very much still NEIL GAIMAN, so this was perfectly sweet and sad and scary.
By far the best YA fiction book I’ve ever read.
I loved this book! Neil Gaiman walks the line between fantastical and realism so well, that a boy growing up in a graveyard with ghosts as parents seems perfectly normal. This book has moments of intrigue, humor, and suspense all geared toward a young adult audience, yet Gaiman shows just enough to keep it interesting for an adult reader. The pay-off at the end, where Bod uses everything he has learned about the graveyard, creates a lovely opportunity for discussion with young readers. I really wish I had known about this book when I was tutoring kids for reading. It would have served as a great introduction to the world of macabre fantasy.
Very good book. I remember the first time I read it I was at the nail salon getting my first pedicure. My feet are ticklish and when he started scrubbing my foot I couldn’t help but laugh. I got some strange look when people noticed the name of the book and that I was laughing at it. Needles to say I didn’t read too much while I was there. However, I did go home and immediately sit in my most comfortable chair so I could finish it. It was a very good book and I think anyone who is open to kids book would enjoy it.
The best sort of book for a rainy day. I love how Gaiman plays with his characters. This book is so much fun!