Neil Gaiman is one of my favorite authors, and his Newbery Medal -winning The Graveyard Book (4.5/5 stars average on Amazon, Whispersync for Voice enabled, currently priced at $6.99 for the illustrated Kindle Edition) is one of my favorite books. While the book is generally classified as something intended for kids aged 10 and up — the Newbery Medal is for children’s books, after all — adults can enjoy it, too.
Gaiman’s prose here is just as direct, and at times charming, as in his more adult-oriented books: he certainly doesn’t “dumb it down” for kids. But he does keep the language and imagery age-appropriate, so this book is considerably less graphic than his American Gods or Anansi Boys.
The Graveyard Book relates the story of Nobody Owens, or “Bod” for short. At the start of the tale he’s a toddler, and narrowly, almost coincidentally, escapes the sad fate of the rest of his family by crawling out of the house during a home invasion. Bod toddles into a nearby graveyard, where the ghost of his mother soon appears, beseeching the other ghostly residents there to protect and care for her child. A sweet, older ghost couple agree to take him in, while the dark and mysterious Silas, who seems to be a leader of some sort in the graveyard, keeps watch and acts as a sort of mentor for Bod as he grows.
Many critics and educators have compared this book favorably to Kipling’s The Jungle Book, and it’s an apt comparison. Much like Mowgli in the jungle, Bod must learn to avoid the many dangers of the graveyard and the world outside, is mentored, protected and educated by beings other than a typical human family, and eventually comes to yearn for the life of a normal human after making friends with a girl.
In Bod’s case, he eventually starts asking what happened to his “real” family. Bod learns the truth, and further learns he must confront the man who killed his family—a “Man Jack” who considers his work unfinished until Bod has been done away with, too.
If you’re thinking all of this sounds a bit too scary for kids, chalk it up to Gaiman’s mastery of prose and storytelling that he manages to take children into dark places without putting anything more than a mild scare into them, and then quickly leads them back out into the light, having conquered their fear right along with the protagonist. My 11 year old daughter recently used this book for a school book report assignment, and she thoroughly enjoyed it.
Do also consider The Graveyard Book Audible Audiobook, which is narrated by Gaiman himself and which you can get at a discounted price if you buy the Kindle edition first—just be sure to follow the provided ‘also buy the audiobook’ link after purchasing the Kindle book to get the discount.
Gaiman is a wonderful reader (surprisingly, not all authors are), and hearing the author’s own inflections definitely adds to one’s understanding and enjoyment of the book.
Whether you get both the Kindle book and the Audible edition, in order to take advantage of the Whispersync for Voice feature, or just one or the other format, Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book is one you and your kids are all likely to enjoy. I rate it 5/5 stars.