TheGraveyardBook

2009 Newbery Winner
Gaiman, N.(2008). //The graveyard book.// New York, NY: Harper Collins Publishers

Nobody ‘Bod’ Owens parents and sister are murdered, while he escapes to a graveyard and is protected by the ghosts there. Bod grows up in the graveyard and is taught the way of life for both the living and the dead. A man is on the hunt for Bod so that he can kill him too and a secret order of evil men can continue on living. Bod then has to fight these men and uses all the resources of the graveyard to do so.
 * Summary:**


 * Grade Level:** 5-10
 * Reading Level:** 5.1

This book would be awesome for teaching inferencing. The text begins with a murder, but initially it is not clear that this is what is happening. The reader must deduct for themselves the evil that is occurring. Due to the fact that there are a few instances in the text in which what is happening is not written out explicitly, this text provides a great instruction tool for inference.
 * Curriculum Connections:**

A baby survives the killing of his family by a mysterious assassin. He crawls to a nearby graveyard and is adopted by the assortment of spooks who occupy the place, soon to include his own recently murdered parents. There he is christened with a new name: Nobody, or Bod for short. Under the watchful tutelage of the dead, Bod learns reading, writing, history, and a few other useful skills-haunting and "disapparating" [disappearing from a location and reappearing in another]. Why It Is a Best: An elegant combination of Gaiman's masterly storytelling and McKean's lovely drawings, this book also works as a series of independent but connected short stories set two years apart, following Bod from age two to 16. Why It Is for Us: In interviews, Gaiman has said that this book took him years to write, and it was worth the wait. Imagine Kipling's The Jungle Book set among a forest of graves. A complete recording of Gaiman reading the book is available on his web site; see also LJ's video with the author from BEA 2008.-Angelina Benedetti, King Cty. Lib. Syst., WA
 * Library Journal Review 2008: (from Mackin)**