From the shelf: The Graveyard Book

Title: The Graveyard Book

Author: Neil Gaiman
Genre: YA, Fantasy, Paranormal
Date read: May 25-June 3, 2015
Dawn Rates: ★★★★★ (5/5)

Summary (cr: goodreads)

After the grisly murder of his entire family, a toddler wanders into a graveyard where the ghosts and other supernatural residents agree to raise him as one of their own.

Nobody Owens, known to his friends as Bod, is a normal boy. He would be completely normal if he didn't live in a sprawling graveyard, being raised and educated by ghosts, with a solitary guardian who belongs to neither the world of the living nor of the dead. There are dangers and adventures in the graveyard for a boy. But if Bod leaves the graveyard, then he will come under attack from the man Jack—who has already killed Bod's family . . 

My Review: (also in goodreads)

This reminded me a bit of Grimm's original fairy tales in which children's stories were realistic and not sugar coated. It is dark, mysterious and interesting at the same time. The first chapter dives into the cruel murder of the protagonist's family and the reason why he was given the freedom of the graveyard, ghosts as parents and a weird creature for a guardian. This book describes Bod's life through the years as well as his adventures and misadventures while getting to know everyone in the graveyard. This may look like a children's story at first but there were some interesting, metaphorical scenes that could be in parallel with real life and that made me turn to the next page. Plus, the fact that this reminds me of Tim Burton....cool.

Till the next read...