Children's Books Too Cool for School

As a Gaiman groupie, I can't tell you how thrilled I was to have Gaiman win the Newbery. As a Gaiman groupie, I'm embarrassed to tell you that I didn't read his award-winning novel when it came out. But, hey, that's easily rectified!

The Graveyard Book is easily the most touching "ghost story" I've ever read. Yeah, I cried at the end. It was funny. It was adventuresome. It was suspenseful. It was totally deserving of the Newbery. At its heart, it is really nothing more than the typical bildungsroman. Child is born, grows up, has to strike out on his own... But, of course, it is what's between those lines that really counts.

Nobody Owens lives in a graveyard. Yes, really! His parents were brutally murdered when he was a child, but the hardy toddler escaped to the local cemetery, and was adopted by the ghosts of Mr. and Mrs. Owens. Although it does take a village to raise a child -- or in this case a graveyard -- and all the inhabitants adore their live boy and take excellent care of him.

But, of course, there comes a point when Nobody (or Bod) yearns to leave the graveyard, even though he knows that the world is not safe for him. You see, the man Jack who came after Bod's family so many years ago is still trying to finish the job.

The episodic nature of this book is interesting, and makes more sense when you read how the book came together. Gaiman wrote a little story for a magazine (which became one of the best chapters in the book) but when he read it to his daughter she wanted to know, "What next?"

And so will you.

Ages 10-14, roughly. The only thing that gives me pause in terms of younger readers is the novel's rather gruesome beginning. For boys and girls and, frankly, anyone who loves a good story. Go Newbery!