The Graveyard Book- Nobody's story

Neil Gaiman won out last weekend. I knew I could count on him to provide me with a real story that would feed my need for story. So I picked up the copy of The Graveyard Book that Aaron and Abby gave me for Christmas.

It is designated "juvenile fiction," but I find that some works in this genre are more compelling than a lot of adult fiction. What matters to me is that is an enjoyable story with interesting characters and both depths and surprises to it. It follows a toddler who escapes death at the hands of a determined killer when the ghostly inhabitants of a graveyard take him in. A couple who never had a child become his parents and a non-living, non-dead gentleman takes the role of guardian.

The book is episodic, looking in on the child at different ages as he learns from the dead around him as well as an occasional living person. The ghosts are varied as they come from different eras of history. Nobody is an appealing child, vulnerable, curious, daring, sweet, and rebellious. How he is at various ages is consistent with children of those ages. He is quite a typical child, if you leave aside that he lives in a graveyard and learns from ghosts and other mystical creatures. But you can't leave that aside and that is what makes the story intriguing. This is a coming of age tale with a definite fantastic bent. It has suspense, horror, yearning, mystery, and a bittersweet ending. Or is it an end? I would love to see the adventures of Nobody Owens as he explores the wider world.

Starved for Story

It has been hectic lately. A lot of time/energy spent preparing for parent-teacher conferences. It's also basketball season, so there have been some games to watch (Go, Duke!) I don't watch a lot of T.V. but it seems several of my favorite shows are up and running new episodes at the same time: Lost, Heroes, and Top Chef. So I realized today that I have not been reading any fiction for a couple of weeks. And I am missing it. The power of Story to refresh me, to invigorate me, to get me to think and feel, and to give me an escape from hectic times, is amazing. When I go for a while without reading fiction, I start missing it with increasing intensity. And I feel duller.

Well I finished up conferences today, so now I'm ready. The only problem is deciding what to dive int0: Shall I finally dive into Neal Stephenson's latest (Anathem)? Would a mystery be lighter fare I would enjoy after working my brain hard? What about the new Neil Gaiman (The Graveyard Book) that Aaron & Abby gave me for Christmas? Or should I start rereading the Orson Scott Card Ender books, as I have been wanting to after listening to the first part of an audio adaptation of Ender's Game?

The Stuff that Dreams are made...on?

My husband Henry writes poetry (http://henryspoetry.blogspot.com/). Recently he wrote a poem that made a reference to a line from The Tempest: "We are such stuff as dreams are made on." When he read the poem to me, I had a sense that it was not exactly right. Isn't it "stuff as dreams are made of?" He proved his point with Google. Of course he was right. He was in a production of The Tempest when he was a teenager and as a Middle School teacher he has produced several versions of it over the years.

So why was it stuck so clearly in my mind as "of?" I've seen the play a number of times over the years. I can usually rely on my memory for things like that. So I wanted to see why I had it wrong in my head.

First I went to my collection of Sandman comics for the issue that focused on the writing of The Tempest, with William Shakespeare as a character. But of course Neil Gaiman got it right. I closed my eyes to see what came to mind. Very clearly I saw Humphery Bogart in The Maltese Falcon, "the stuff that dreams are made of." He was responding to a question of what the Maltese Falcon was. I googled it and sure enough he said "of" rather than "on." I'm not sure if I should be chagrined or not that I remember a Shakespeare line based on how it was misquoted in a movie!