There and Back Again

As I wrote in my last post I've finished reading "The Graveyard Book" by Neil Gaiman and I decided to share some notes.
The first thing that caught my attention is that I think Bod's guardian (Bod is the main character in the story. Bod is short for Nobody, his full name is Nobody Owens which I'm pretty short has some relation to Nobody Owns Him), the strange and enigmatic Silas takes his name from Silas Marner, the novel by George Elliott. I found it an amusing detail since Silas Marner does indeed look after a child later in the novel. I have not confirmed this but I'm pretty sure there is a connection.

At some point in the novel the term "Hound of God" appears. Now I had done some research concerning werewolves and I remembered that I had seen that term somewhere. I googled it and I found this: A man named Theiss in 1692, said during a trial in Jurgenburg, Livonia that he was a werewolf, a "Hound of God" who were warriors dedicated to fighting demons and witches in the depths of hell. Now, I think this is probably one of the few records in which werewolves are described as good, and as servants of God for Lycanthropy has always been associated with the devil in most cases as far as I know.

Finally I noticed something in the book that really made me smile and marvel at what an accomplished writer Neil is. As Bod moves through the various tombstones and crypts he encounters, the narrator describes some of the curious epitaphs that are written among these gravestones. Here are is one that I really liked:

Miss Letitia Borrows, Spinster of this Parish (who did no harm to no man all the Dais of her Life. Reader, can you say Lykewise?)

I find it incredible the way he plays with his prose and the deepness he accomplishes. I could mention more but I leave those for you to discover along with Bod's adventures.

Before I forget to mention it, The Graveyard book won the ALSC Newbery Medal, now this came a bit as a surprise since I've never really associated Neil with the Newbery medal books I use to read. The memory of those books seems to come from a totally different world that is not connected Neil's work. But then again that is just me and medal or no medal, The Graveyard Book despite it's grim setting is full of humanity and a strange notion that childhood, despite its surroundings, can overcome anything. Even death.