Book Review: The Graveyard Book

Nobody Owens is a normal boy, just like other little boys. He learns his letters and loves to read, but what separates Bod, as he's known to his friends and family, is that he lives within the confines of a cemetery. His parents and teachers are all ghosts, and his guardian is something even more strange and mysterious, but Bod doesn't know the difference. He's lived in the graveyard every since he was a toddling baby, which just goes to show that sometimes the things that go bump in the night are far less dangerous than that which walks in the light.

Master storyteller, Neil Gaiman, returns with yet another fantastical tale that will make you look at the every day ordinary world with wonder and surprise. The Graveyard Book begins with a dark and sinister man named Jack who has only just finished brutally murdering a small family. He's just about to finish off the family by killing the final member, a toddling baby boy, but the boy is nowhere to be found.

Taken in and protected by the ghosts in the graveyard just blocks from the scene of the crime, it is only within the walls of the cemetery that the baby can remain safe. Named Nobody by his adopted ghost parents, as Bod grows and learns the truth about the outside world and the danger that awaits him there, he becomes adept at walking the line between the living and the dead. More haunted by the details of his past than the ghosts that surround him, the outside world proves to be repeatedly dangerous in every instance Bod ventures out, which makes it remarkably difficult for him to make friends with anyone else alive.

Only from the mind of Neil Gaiman could such a realistic tale be spun from the threads of dreams. Each character in every scene from page one through page three-hundred and seven is delightful. Gaiman continually writes the kind of urban fairytales that make adults and youths alike daydream long after the final page has been read with a delighted sigh.

The Graveyard Book is absolutely as memorable as Coraline, Stardust and Mirrormask.

Book Review: Untamed: A House of Night Novel

Zoey Redbird, Vampyre fledgling and high priestess-in-training, is back in P.C. and Kristin Cast's Untamed: A House of Night Novel.

It's barely been three days since the brutal massacre on campus of the drama teacher, Professor Nolan, and Vampyre Poet Laureate, Loren Blake (who turned out to be a total user jerk!). Nepheret cancelled winter break the students are called back to campus without winter break by Nepheret. Loren is dead, Erik hates her and the imprint bond she had with Heath was broken during her impromptu fling with Loren Blake. After all the secrets she's been keeping, Damien, Jack and the Twins are still not speaking to her, and her once enemy, Aphrodite, is now her only friend and ally.

That would be okay if a strange, ghoulish creature hadn't just attacked her in the courtyard on her way to the dining hall. No one really seems to care much until she turns to Aphrodite, who shares a vision with Zoey that requires everyone to either pull together and make nice again, or scatter like marbles. When the threat of doom takes the form of a dark angel with a host of demons paving the way, Zoey will not only need to be able to rely on the closeness of her friends, but she'll have to call on her Cherokee heritage to make things right.

The fourth installment in the House of Night Series weaves nicely into this mother/daughter tapestry of teen triumph, adversity and angst. Amidst a world turned asunder, they manage to incorporate realistic human behaviors powerful enough to make the reader laugh and cry alongside the characters. The language is natural and the characters incredibly real. My only complaint is that we now have to wait until March 2009 for Book 5!

House of Night as a series is right up there with the Twilight Series by Stephenie Meyer. There are elements of romance entangled in the complicated everyday troubles of teen life, but to charge those troubles even more the characters must deal with their vampire nature.

House of Night also embodies the spiritual dilemmas faced by many teens in today's society, especially teens who have chosen to follow pagan and/or wiccan paths. Zoey Redbird comes from a Cherokee background, raised by a grandmother who still practices many of the old native spiritual customs. Zoey's mother is married to a man who is part of a Christian extremist group, and when she is marked by the goddess Nyx as a Vampyre fledgling, her mother and stepfather completely disown her. These actions are played upon in such a way that it's difficult to find a sympathetic view on Christianity until Untamed, with the introduction of Catholic nun who runs Street Cats.

I could easily see this series turning into an awesome TV drama. Check it out! Oh, and be sure to visit their website, they have a lot of fun things for teens--vampyre and human alike.