Fiction Book Reviews

Now that I’ve actually read it, I’m doubly pleased that The Graveyard Book won the Newbery, because it’s a wonderful book with an amazingly creative premise—a boy whose family is murdered is taken in and raised by a graveyard full of ghosts, along with a few other guardians who aren’t ghosts but aren’t exactly human either (one is basically a werewolf, and the other is a vampire, which I totally did not figure out until Neil actually said so on the Colbert Report. I r smrt.). I was thoroughly taken in by the first couple pages, with the man Jack’s terrifying, methodical murder, but to be honest, I was a little concerned—that the murder would just sort of happen and we wouldn’t find out why or what would happen to the man Jack, that the book would just be a coming-of-age story for Nobody Owens without much of an overarching plot.

And then I reminded myself, don’t be silly, this is Neil Gaiman and you can trust him. I did, and he didn’t disappoint: it’s a coming-of-age story, certainly, tracing Bod’s life from toddlerhood up to about age 14, but it definitely has a plot, and it’s rich with the kind of worldbuilding and mythological elements you can play with when your character spends his life among the dead. There’s a twist near the end that I did see coming, but that didn’t bother me much; it just put me in an agony of suspense for characters who didn’t know their own danger, so of course I wanted to reach through the pages and yell at them to watch out, which at least shows that they were real enough to make me invested in them.

But I can’t give my full opinion on this without spoiling the ending, so read on at your own risk. The only thing that kept me from completely loving The Graveyard Book was the ending. I don’t entirely mind a bittersweet ending exactly, especially if it’s the sort of book preparing me for one, and in a coming-of-age novel, it’s pretty much inevitable that the young protagonist will grow up and leave home to take his place in the world or whatever. It didn’t surprise me much when that happened with Bod, although the way it happened was rather sad—he started to become unable to talk to his friends and family in the graveyard and losing the ghostlike abilities he’d gained. Unlike an awful lot of people, he can’t ever go home again, at least not until he dies (and I sure hope he makes arrangements to be buried in his home graveyard).

But that wasn’t really what bothered me. I didn’t like the treatment of Scarlett—she did speak up and wanted a voice in the decision of what to do with her but didn’t really make a choice, especially since she’d more or less turned against Bod by then, so of course her memory did get erased. The fact that this was almost her choice made it worse. Bod never managed to explain, but I really believe that he didn’t deliberately use her as bait—sure, maybe he was more concerned with the safety of his home than with her, but I think he hoped to fight the man Jack somewhere else and left Scarlett in that particular crypt because it might well be safe but would also let him use the Sleer as a last resort if necessary. (Speaking of which, I did wonder if that was based on some particular mythology or legend, or if Gaiman made it up whole cloth. Also if at some point the Sleer will actually, you know, do something with/for their master other than “protecting” him. Because that would be bad.) So as usual I decided to make it better by settling on a somewhat happier personal canon: Bod goes to Glasgow at some point and runs into Scarlett, maybe deliberately, maybe accidentally, and she does remember him, enough that they can pick up sort of where they left off. (At some point I’ll probably write that fic. I also have fix-it fic planned for the Darkangel Trilogy, because…yeah.)

My main problem is the way Bod had to leave. He’s fourteen years old. He’s got enough money to get him started, whatever that means, and that’s it. I’m glad he understands that the world’s both beautiful and ugly, and that he wants to see everything, and I think those attitudes will stand him in good stead. Otherwise? He knows a lot, sure, and probably he can take care of himself, but he’s lost all the supernatural abilities he gained from living in the graveyard, so he has nothing extra to give him an edge, and he has no marketable skills to speak of. Also he’s fourteen. At that age, I don’t see how Silas’ money can get him started in life—he’s not old enough to get a house or a job, and even if he can survive just fine on the streets, that’s not the right kind of life for him. He definitely doesn’t have the money or education to get him going in a career, or any kind of lifestyle, that might actually be successful and fulfilling. He needs to see and do everything, because after growing up with the dead, he’s discovered a passion for living. And that’s wonderful. It’s also easy to lose.

This is what I don’t think he’s ready for: compared to his upbringing, the real world can be horribly, painfully mundane. There’s no magic, not like he’s used to, and in some ways I think the disillusionment that would result from having that dullness hammered into him would hurt more than understanding that the world can be cruel. At least cruelty is sharp and strong. Bod can deal with that. He already has. I don’t think he can deal with flat and plain and gray. And I can’t get away from an image of Nobody Owens stuck flipping burgers at McDonalds because there’s nothing else he can do, and he can’t leave for a better life because he needs the money. And that’s about the saddest thing I can imagine.

Trackback URI | Comments RSS