Coraline
by Neil Gaiman
Book Summary Information
Author: Neil GaimanEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2006-09-01
ISBN: 0061139378
Number of pages: 192
Reading Level: Young Adult
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Product features:
- ISBN13: 9780061139376
- Condition: NEW
- Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
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Book Reviews of Coraline
Book Review: Avoid Buttons at All Cost...
Summary: 4 Stars
Neil Gaiman has written a deliciously, wickedly scary book for children, very reminiscent of master children's book writer Roald Dahl. The heroine, young Coraline, is an explorer by her very nature. During a particularly boring day, Coraline borrows an old key from her mother and unmasks a door that leads her to a scary adventure that includes her "other mother," a wicked, evil creation with button eyes who wants Coraline to live with her forever. In the course of the adventure, Coraline must rescue three children who have lost their souls to the "other mother" and also Coraline's very own parents, who have been taken captive. Along the way she meets a talking cat who becomes her dear friend and rescuer. I can't wait to read more of Neil Gaiman. He is most famous for his The Sandman comics, which have been wildly popular for years.
Summary of Coraline
In Coraline's family's new flat there's a locked door. On the other side is a brick wall—until Coraline unlocks the door . . . and finds a passage to another flat in another house just like her own.
Only different.
The food is better there. Books have pictures that writhe and crawl and shimmer. And there's another mother and father there who want Coraline to be their little girl. They want to change her and keep her with them. . . . Forever.
Coraline is an extraordinary fairy tale/nightmare from the uniquely skewed imagination of #1 New York Times bestselling author Neil Gaiman.
Coraline lives with her preoccupied parents in part of a huge old house--a house so huge that other people live in it, too... round, old former actresses Miss Spink and Miss Forcible and their aging Highland terriers ("We trod the boards, luvvy") and the mustachioed old man under the roof ("'The reason you cannot see the mouse circus,' said the man upstairs, 'is that the mice are not yet ready and rehearsed.'") Coraline contents herself for weeks with exploring the vast garden and grounds. But with a little rain she becomes bored--so bored that she begins to count everything blue (153), the windows (21), and the doors (14). And it is the 14th door that--sometimes blocked with a wall of bricks--opens up for Coraline into an entirely alternate universe. Now, if you're thinking fondly of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe or Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, you're on the wrong track. Neil Gaiman's Coraline is far darker, far stranger, playing on our deepest fears. And, like Roald Dahl's work, it is delicious.
What's on the other side of the door? A distorted-mirror world, containing presumably everything Coraline has ever dreamed of... people who pronounce her name correctly (not "Caroline"), delicious meals (not like her father's overblown "recipes"), an unusually pink and green bedroom (not like her dull one), and plenty of horrible (very un-boring) marvels, like a man made out of live rats. The creepiest part, however, is her mirrored parents, her "other mother" and her "other father"--people who look just like her own parents, but with big, shiny, black button eyes, paper-white skin... and a keen desire to keep her on their side of the door. To make creepy creepier, Coraline has been illustrated masterfully in scritchy, terrifying ink drawings by British mixed-media artist and Sandman cover illustrator Dave McKean. This delightful, funny, haunting, scary as heck, fairy-tale novel is about as fine as they come. Highly recommended. (Ages 11 and older) --Karin Snelson
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