The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
Illustrated by Dave McKean
HarperCollins, New York, 2008
Organized by Carl V, Week 2 of our read-along covers Chapters 4 thru 6 and includes an Interlude. Please visit Carl’s blog for links to other posts about this magical book.
One of the best things about The Graveyard Book is that it is made up of many stories, stories of Nobody Owen, growing up, protected and loved by ghosts and other beings that pass between worlds.
We learn a bit more about his guardian Silas, and Bod learns a bit more about the place where he lives. He meets the ghost of a lovely young witch and tries to do something kind for her. Leaving the Graveyard for the first time since his arrival he runs into trouble. Maybe the world of the living, outside of the Graveyard fence, is not the best place for a live boy with a kind heart. But on rare occasions ghosts visit there, and sometimes the living dance with the dead.
They took hands, the living with the dead, and they began to dance. Bod saw Mother Slaughter dancing with the man in the turban, while the businessman was dancing with Louisa Bartleby. Mistress Owens smiled at Bod as she took the hand of the old newspaper seller, and Mr. Owens reached out and took the hand of a small girl as if she had been waiting to dance with him her whole life. Then Bod stopped looking because someone’s hand closed around his, and the dance began.
Liza Hempstock grinned at him. “This is fine,” she said, as they began to tread the steps of the dance together.
Then she sand, to the tune of the dance,
“Step and turn, and walk and stay,
Now we dance the Macabray.” From page 159.
During the interlude we discover that the Man Jack needs to finish what he started.
Bod learns to fade and to haunt. And craving knowledge of the world of the living, he goes to school.
Gaiman has a way about him. A way of mixing life and death and giving grace to both. Bod’s story is lovely and sad and joyful all at the same time, and oh so gentle, even at it’s most horrific. I don’t know how this author does it. It is a mystery, eerie and beautiful.
Page247 
You have lovely descriptions of the themes of the book!
Bod does have a kind heart, but also a strong determination to continue to learn from both the living and the dead. There are also those few lines between him and Silas where Bod says that Jack should be afraid of him. Even though this is a re-read for me, I look forward to reading the book slower this time and savoring the last bit.
I keep forgetting to write a post for this! Ack! Maybe next time. You are so right about Gaiman. It amazes me so much whenever I read him. I always want to know how he comes up with certain passages or themes. He’s a very special writer.
Great recap. I, too, am ever impressed by Gaiman’s talent to take an otherwise grim story and turn it into something so natural and even graceful. I’m particularly fond of the interactions between Bod and Silas. They’re both heartwarming and bittersweet at the same time.
Thanks Christine. Gaiman keeps me amazed and off balance with his writing.
I thought it was so interesting that Bod got to learn how to fade and haunt. Imagine being alive and being able to do that!
Yes! Sort of like having superpowers, but different..
I loved this book. Gaiman is amazing, isn’t he?
Gaiman is amazing and he keeps surprising me..