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Coraline - Gaiman, Neil

Coraline

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When Coraline moves with her parents to a new house she is fascinated by the fact that their 'house' is in fact only half a house! Divided into flats years before, there is a brick wall behind a door where once there was a corridor and one day it is corridor again, down which the intrepid Coraline wanders. And so a nightmare-ish mystery begins that takes Coraline into the arms of counterfeit parents and a life that isn't quite right. Can Coraline get out? Can she find her real parents? Will life ever be the same again? "I ...

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John C

Feb 4, 2015

darkly beautiful

I think my precocious and imaginative granddaughter will love this book when she's 8. It's rich language and story are at the edge of what she can now parse and contemplate.

Patricia S

Aug 30, 2013

Better than the movie

This is a well written, enchanting story. This edition has wonderful drawings and just enough mystery to keep you turning the pages in a hurry. Highly recommended. The movie was fun, but you have to read it to appreciate Gaiman's whimsy.

Chapelhill1978

Feb 18, 2010

A fine achievement

Neil Gaiman's novel is a smart and witty psychological deconstruction of the modern myth of parental affect, the illusion of the perfect family and the social control of the well-behaved child. Shifting between a sense of mild desperation and the qrotesque horror that springs from organized family life, the author manages to excorcise our childhood fears by allowing us to dream once more of a parent-child relationship that derives its healing power not from the need to attempt perfection, but rather from its human flaws, which allows us to breathe once more.

heartkitty

Aug 14, 2009

Good

I have read the book and have not taken time to view the DVD yet. The book is excellent and I hope the video will be likewise.

mothergoose3

Apr 28, 2009

Strangest, deliciously creepy book I have read

Coraline by Neil Gaiman

Coraline by Neil Gaiman

This is the strangest, deliciously creepy book I have read in recent memory. I could not put this book down. It is not a long story, but is definitely satisfyingly complete. The illustrations just add to the flavor.

Coraline is easily bored, especially since she and her parents moved into the new house. But Coraline likes to explore. There are fourteen doors in the new house but one is locked and won't open. There is a key; when her mother unlocked the door nothing was revealed but a brick wall. The house is made up of probably three flats on her side of the big house, and the other tenants are nice, though a little strange. Two old ladies who read tea-leaves in one flat and a strange old man who talks of his musical band of mice in another. Returning to her own flat after visiting her neighbors, Coraline dwells on the problem of the door that is locked. There must be an equal part of the house on the other side.

Alone one day, she climbs up and snags the bunch of keys hanging high on the wall, which fall to the floor. Taking the one odd key, and on opening the door discovers that the brick wall is not there but there is a long corridor. This is where the book moves from a somewhat typical young adult book to a horror story with all its mystical and exciting thrills, because down the corridor is a replica of their own side of the house, but not quite right. Strangely the rooms are furnished with the same furniture, but slightly off. And strangest of all, Coraline's mother is there, but not quite. From here the story must be read because what thrill would one get if there are spoilers in the review!

I really enjoyed this book, was fascinated by it, and will definitely be reading a lot more of Gaiman's books. I highly recommend it to anyone who likes shivers from ghost stories told around a campfire (this is not a ghost story, but the analogy works). I would not recommend it for young children, though.

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