From the Bookshelf of Once Upon a Time...

The Graveyard Book
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Original Tales
Why we're reading this
09/22/22 nominated by Nicole

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Group Discussions About This Book

Showing 2 of 6 topics — 169 comments total
+ Original Tales
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What Members Thought

Katharina Gerlach
Jan 19, 2013 rated it liked it
Shelves: jan-yc-blue
I'm a big fan of Neil Gaiman but lately some of his books fell flat for me. This is one of them. I loved the story up to the point where the bad guy(s) show up. From there on, everything became terribly trivial and it was too easy to see where the story was going.

The characters from the cemetery were simply marvelous. I loved the ambiguity of some of them. And I loved the way they did their best to raise a living child -- not exactly easy when you're dead.

I'm sure this book makes a good read for
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Majuchan
Aug 04, 2018 rated it really liked it  ·  review of another edition
“Things blossom in their time. They bud and bloom, bloom and fade. Everything in its time.”

“If you dare nothing, then when the day is over, nothing is all you will have gained.”


One of a kind. A boy living in a cemetery with ghosts as his charge. With this one, Gaiman captivated my imagination.

Every word and pages, every crypt and headstone, I become hungry with it. I wish to be part of Bod’s life (of course as someone living. Hehe)

The residents of the graveyard are so scary. Nah! They are
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Jessica Andersen
I have yet to read something by Neil Gaiman that I didn't just love. He was an author that I'd wanted to read and I think I finally read a short story in an anthology, then moved to American Gods and the Sandman Graphic Novels.

The Graveyard book is amazing. It is a little hard to believe it's a children's book. It starts out very creepy, but I didn't feel it ever got too scary. The book is the story of Nobody Owens, called Bod for short. He is being raised in a graveyard by a ghost couple, with
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Mia
Great to see a book from Gaiman that didn’t have a flat, cop-out type climax. This book felt well-planned and more solid towards the end. I think I prefer his YA stuff to his adult books, as Coraline was also a treat.

Am knocking off half a star (or one star since Goodreads doesn’t go half) for the familiar set of characters that I’m starting to see in every book he writes and the complete lack of building a backstory around Bod’s ghost parents. They are introduced from the beginning and then Sil
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Kandi Massey
Jun 26, 2012 marked it as to-read
D
Jul 17, 2012 rated it really liked it
Shelves: ya, fairy-tales
Kei Tanabe
Aug 22, 2012 rated it it was amazing
Amanda
Sep 21, 2012 marked it as to-read
Shelves: books-i-want
Ladonna
Oct 09, 2012 marked it as to-read
Heather Johnson
Oct 11, 2012 rated it it was amazing
Parvathy
Mar 04, 2013 marked it as to-read
Tessa
May 21, 2013 marked it as to-read
Elana Barth
May 22, 2013 rated it it was ok
Nichelle
Jul 24, 2017 rated it it was amazing
Rachel Clifton
Nov 12, 2013 rated it it was amazing
Shayna Varadeaux
Jan 29, 2014 marked it as to-read
Rusty Nugent
Mar 22, 2014 rated it it was amazing
Shantyl
Oct 03, 2014 marked it as to-read
Mark Machlay
Sep 12, 2015 rated it liked it
Eileen Sheridan
Jun 24, 2016 marked it as to-read
Terewood
Dec 10, 2016 marked it as to-read
H.
Jul 17, 2019 rated it really liked it
Shelves: young-adult, fantasy
K.M.
Jan 24, 2019 marked it as to-read
Andie
Dec 11, 2019 marked it as to-read
Resa
Jun 12, 2020 marked it as to-read
Kathleen Newton
Oct 12, 2023 rated it really liked it
Shelves: z-2023-katie
Charissa
Jan 22, 2022 marked it as to-read  ·  review of another edition
Shelves: audiobooks