The Graveyard Book tells the story of a toddler whose family is slaughtered by a mysterious assassin. The child finds refuge in a nearby graveyard, where he is given the name of Nobody and raised by ghosts. The book follows Nobody through his youth, and each section takes place at a different stage in Nobody's young life. It's chock full of the quirky characters and clever turns of phrase which are the hallmark of Gaiman's writing. I can't pretend to be unbiased on this topic. Neil Gaiman is on my short list of "authors whose books I allow myself to purchase brand new, in hardcover when necessary." (It's a very short list. Have you seen the price of a new hardback book lately?!) Even so, I love some of his books more than others. As a rule, his Young Adult fiction leaves me unmoved. Therefore, I was unprepared for how much I would end up liking The Graveyard Book. For its intended audience (ages 9-12), The Graveyard Book is an engrossing tale of adventure and mystery - albeit one where the pacing occasionally falters. Nobody is resourceful, clever, kind, and inquisitive, the perfect protagonist. The book's morbid setting is eerie and comical by turns, and never too much of either. For an older audience, the book is about the inevitable process of growing up, and what happens as you slowly learn to "put aside childish things." Although Nobody is a normal human boy who grows at a normal human rate, the members of his extended family (being dead) are essentially frozen in time. Unable to learn or change, they offer a poignant contrast to Nobody's own development from toddler to young man. As he ages, he leaves his childhood friends behind in the emotional sense, but they remain in the literal sense, and they can't understand why he has lost interest in playing with them. I had the funny feeling, as I read the book, that it was designed to grow up along with the reader. If you read it for the first time at age nine, it would seem an entirely different book if you read it again at age ten, and so forth. The structure of the book is such that it will avoid the fate of Nobody's deceased companions. That's a pretty clever trick, given that a book (much like a dead person) can't change once it's finished. My only complaint is that The Big Twist (which I won't reveal) was, in hindsight, glaringly obvious. I say "in hindsight" because when I read The Bit Where Everything Changes, I literally gasped aloud. You'd have to be a pretty big chump not to See It Coming, but I really didn't. In the wake of Harry Potter's popularity, the Young Adult market has seen an uptick both in sales and in the quality of books being published. The Graveyard Book recently hit #1 on the New York Times Young Adult bestseller list, and made Time Magazine's Top Ten Fiction Books of 2008 list. (Not "Young Adult Fiction," but plain old "Fiction.") Quite an accomplishment, and every bit of it is well-deserved.