S.J. Parris
S.J. Parris writes about her inspiration for Heresy, which masterfully blends true events with fiction into a page-turning murder mystery set on the sixteenth-century Oxford University campus.
Adam Haslett
A conversation with Adam Haslett, author of Union Atlantic, a deeply affecting portrait of the modern gilded age, the first decade of the twenty-first century.
The day after they moved in, Coraline went exploring....
In Coraline's family's new flat are twenty-one windows and fourteen doors. Thirteen of the doors open and close.
The fourteenth is locked, and on the other side is only a brick wall, until the day Coraline unlocks the door to find a passage to another flat in another house just like her own.
Only it's different.
At first, things seem marvelous in the other flat. The food is better. The toy box is filled with wind-up angels that flutter around the bedroom, books whose pictures writhe and crawl and shimmer, little dinosaur skulls that chatter their teeth. But there's another mother, and another father, and they want Coraline to stay with them and be their little girl. They want to change her and never let her go.
Other children are trapped there as well, lost souls behind the mirrors. Coraline is their only hope of rescue. She will have to fight with all her wits and all the tools she can find if she is to save the lost children, her ordinary life, and herself.
Critically acclaimed and award-winning author Neil Gaiman will delight readers with his first novel for all ages.
A note from Neil Gaiman about Coraline "More then ten years ago I started to write a children’s book. It was for my daughter, Holly, who was five years old. I wanted it to have a girl as a heroine, and I wanted it to be refreshingly creepy. I started to write a story about a girl named Coraline. I thought that the story would be five or ten pages long. The story itself had other plans.... It was a story, I learned when people began to read it, that children experienced as an adventure, but which gave adults nightmares. It's the strangest book I've written, it took the longest time to write, and it's the book I'm proudest of."
Book Reviews
BookBrowse
Gaiman has crafted a superbly creepy and surreal fairy tale which will appeal to robust children from about age 9, and most children aged 11 and up. For younger children, new to the horror genre, the story may seem a little slow at the beginning as there is little tangible 'action' and the subtlety of the building tension might pass them by, but if they make it through the first few chapters they're likely to be hooked! Particularly recommended is the audio version read by Gaiman in a well paced, somewhat sinister voice which is enhanced by music and effects from the Gothic Arches who have also been featured on the audio versions of the Lemony Snicket books 'A Series of Unfortunate Events'.
Booklist - Stephanie Zvirin
Gr. 5-8. ...an often-compelling horror novel, but, as with so many adult authors who attempt to reach young readers, his grasp of his audience is less sure than his command of his material.
School Library Journal - Bruce Anne Shock
The story is odd, strange, even slightly bizarre, but kids will hang on every word. Coraline is a character with whom they will surely identify, and they will love being frightened out of their shoes. This is just right for all those requests for a scary book. Grades 6-8.
Publishers Weekly
.... an electrifyingly creepy tale likely to haunt young readers for many moons.... a real bedtime-buster. Ages 8-up.
Kirkus Reviews
Starred Review. A magnificently creepy fantasy.... Not for the faint-hearted--who are mostly adults anyway--but for stouthearted kids who love a brush with the sinister Coraline is spot on.
Washington Post Book World
Gaiman’s tale is inventive, scary, thrilling and finally affirmative. Readers young and old will find something to startle them.
San Francisco Chronicle Book Review
By turns creepy and funny, bittersweet and playful…can be read quickly and enjoyed deeply.
Children's Literature - Joan Kindig
... a good edge-of-your-seat read without being terribly frightening. For those children who like to be scared, Gaiman's novel is a well-written alternative to Goosebumps.
New York Times Book Review
A modern ghost story with all the creepy trimmings…Well done.
Times Educational Supplement
As we used to say, it blew my mind…chilly, finely-wrought prose, a truly weird setting and a fable that taps into our most uncomfortable fears.
Philip Pullman
Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, rise to your feet and applaud Coraline is the real thing.
Orson Scott Card
A deliciously scary book that we loved reading together as a family.
Diana Wynne Jones
The most splendidly original, weird, and frightening book I have read, and yet full of things children will love.
Terry Pratchett
It has the delicate horror of the finest fairy tales, and it is a masterpiece.
You are about to travel to Edgecombe St. Mary, a small village in the English countryside filled with rolling hills, thatched cottages, and a cast of characters both hilariously original and as familiar as the members of your own family.
The Postmistress is an unforgettable tale of the secrets we must bear, or bury. It is about what happens to love during wartime, when those we cherish leave. And how every story-of love or war-is about looking left when we should have been looking right.
Masterfully blending true events with fiction, this blockbuster historical thriller delivers a page-turning murder mystery set on the sixteenth-century Oxford University campus.
Kostova's masterful new novel travels from American cities to the coast of Normandy, from the late 19th century to the late 20th, from young love to last love. The Swan Thieves is a story of obsession, history's losses, and the power of art to preserve human hope.
I read this book in two days and found it so refreshing. Although you will learn a great deal about barn owls by reading it, the book is not just ...
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I enjoyed reading this book, however, feel that this is not completely her own ideas. This books remembers me of a cross between 'ghost','Sixth ...
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Lisa See has written a great book! This story is satisfying on many levels, some scenes horrifying, but seemingly truthful, and her handling of the ...
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Amazon 'buy button' rumors abound(Mar 18 2010) Rumors swirled today that Amazon could revoke the buy buttons for books by Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins, Penguin, or Hachette if the major publishers can't...
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Amazon's e-pricing threats(Mar 18 2010) With Apple's iPad launch just weeks away, Amazon raised the stakes again when it threatened to stop directly selling the books of some publishers online...
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Coraline
BookBrowse
Booklist - Stephanie Zvirin
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