A Broken Family and Misconstrued Future

In The Graveyard Book, a broken family and a lost future, it grabs you in with a compelling first paragraph that throws the writing style of Neil Gaiman for a loop.  In the opening scene the main antagonist, Jack, kills three of a family of four.  The fourth, who is nameless at the beginning of the book, escapes from death grasps and wanders into the cold night.  This grabbing opening sets the tone for a riveting and well written book.

The escape artist baby toddled his way into a graveyard where he is adopted by the ghosts of the graveyard and is protected from Jack by them.  The married couple that takes him in are Mr. and Mrs. Owens and give him the name Nobody (Bod for short) because nobody knows his name.  As the needs of Bod become very essential, Silas, a part ghost, part human creature, can get Bod the necessary sustenance he requires.  Silas becomes the guardian of Bod and can pass in and out of the graveyard whenever he wants.  As Bod grows up in the restraints of the graveyard he starts to gain more privileges in the outside world.  He makes a living friend named Scarlette and eventually even goes to regular school.  This book is chronologically following Bod and his own coming of age through an upbringing of ghosts and ghostly powers.  Gaiman does a good job on focusing on on Bod but maybe does too good of a job at it.  The book could’ve covered many more characters than just Bod and is very exclusive towards him.  

A positive aspect of Gaiman’s writing is his strong characterizations, scenery, and mysteries that are sometimes left unsolved and not fully explained.  The reader is never left short of a picture painted in the mind of where an event is taking place.  “He slipped down into it, behind the coffin, and down and down and still further down, down to the tiny stone steps cut into the center of the hill, and the he descended until he reached the stone chamber.  It was dark in that tomb, dark as a tin mine, but Bod saw as the dead see and the room gave up its secrets to him” (Gaiman 114-115).  Excerpts like that really show how Gaiman uses his words to paint a picture in the mind of the reader.  Having a picture in your mind really makes this book a page turner.  Another key aspect of the writing of Gaiman is his use of characterizations used to describe a character in such detail that you form a connection with each.  As he describes the characters he stays to the point at hand and is concise.  “His hair was dark and his eyes were dark and he wore black leather gloves of the thinnest lambskin” (Gaiman 8).  

This very visual type of writing and fun read does not go without it’s flaws.  At some parts during the book you are left wondering what happens to other characters as Gaiman only follows Bod.  The backstory of other characters could be very insightful but he does not give the reader this luxury.  “Her name was Scarlette Amber Perkins, she told him, and she lived in a flat with no garden” (Gaiman 41).  This can annoy the reader and keeps the reader wanting a prologue or a second book in the series.  As a reader finishes reading The Graveyard Book they are left with an impression of how good the writing of Gaiman truly is.  There will be a hunger for more of his works that are littered with great plots and writing styles.  The Graveyard Book is a great and easy read that never pulls up short of a scary and exhilarating ending.

Gaiman, Neil, and Dave McKean. The Graveyard Book. New York: HarperCollins Pub., 2008. Print.