The Graveyard Book Read online

  Then the last lines of the song came back to Mistress Owens, and she sang them to her son.

  “Face your life

  Its pain, its pleasure,

  Leave no path untaken”

  “Leave no path untaken,” repeated Bod. “A difficult challenge, but I can try my best.”

  He tried to put his arms around his mother then, as he had when he was a child, although he might as well have been trying to hold mist, for he was alone on the path.

  He took a step forward, through the gate that took him out of the graveyard. He thought a voice said, “I am so proud of you, my son,” but he might, perhaps, have imagined it.

  The midsummer sky was already beginning to lighten in the east, and that was the way that Bod began to walk: down the hill, towards the living people, and the city, and the dawn.

  There was a passport in his bag, money in his pocket. There was a smile dancing on his lips, although it was a wary smile, for the world is a bigger place than a little graveyard on a hill; and there would be dangers in it and mysteries, new friends to make, old friends to rediscover, mistakes to be made and many paths to be walked before he would, finally, return to the graveyard or ride with the Lady on the broad back of her great grey stallion.

  But between now and then, there was Life; and Bod walked into it with his eyes and his heart wide open.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  First, foremost, and forever: I owe an enormous debt, conscious and, I have no doubt, unconscious, to Rudyard Kipling and the two volumes of his remarkable work The Jungle Book. I read them as a child, excited and impressed, and I’ve read and reread them many times since. If you are only familiar with the Disney cartoon, you should read the stories.

  My son Michael inspired this book. He was only two years old, riding his little tricycle between gravestones in the summer, and I had a book in my head. Then it just took me twenty-something years to write it.

  When I started writing the book (I started with Chapter Four), only my daughter Maddy’s request to know what happened next kept me writing beyond the first couple of pages.

  Gardner Dozois and Jack Dann were the first people to publish “The Witch’s Headstone.” Professor Georgia Grilli talked about what this book was without having read it, and listening to her talk helped throw the themes into focus.

  Kendra Stout was there when I saw the first ghoul gate, and was kind enough to walk through several graveyards with me. She was the first audience for the first chapters, and her love for Silas was awesome.

  Artist and author Audrey Niffenegger is also a graveyard guide, and she showed me around the ivy-covered marvel that is Highgate Cemetery West. A lot of what she told me crept into Chapters Six and Seven.

  Many friends read this book as it was being written, and all of them offered wise suggestions—Dan Johnson, Gary K. Wolfe, John Crowley, Moby, Farah Mendlesohn, and Joe Sanders, among others. They spotted things I needed to fix. Still, I missed John M. Ford (1957–2006), who was my best critic of all.

  Isabel Ford, Elise Howard, Sarah Odedina, and Clarissa Hutton were the book’s editors on both sides of the Atlantic. They made me look good. Michael Conroy directed the audio-book version with aplomb. Mr. McKean and Mr. Riddell both drew wonderfully, and differently. Merrilee Heifetz is the best agent in the world, and Dorie Simmonds made it happen excellently in the UK.

  I wrote this book in many places: among other places, Jonathan and Jane’s Florida house, a cottage in Cornwall, a hotel room in New Orleans; and I failed to write in Tori’s house in Ireland because I had flu there instead. But she helped and inspired me, nonetheless.

  And as I finish these thanks, the only thing I’m certain of is that I have forgotten not just one very important person but dozens of them. Sorry. But thank you all anyway.

  —Neil Gaiman

  I said

  she’s gone

  but I’m alive, I’m alive

  I’m coming in the graveyard

  to sing you to sleep now

  —Tori Amos, “GRAVEYARD”

  About the Author

  NEIL GAIMAN is the author of several books for children, including the New York Times bestselling CORALINE; the collection of short stories for young readers M IS FOR MAGIC; and INTERWORLD, co-authored with Michael Reaves. His picture books include THE WOLVES IN THE WALLS and THE DAY I SWAPPED MY DAD FOR TWO GOLDFISH, illustrated by Dave McKean, and THE DANGEROUS ALPHABET, illustrated by Gris Grimly. He wrote the script for the film MirrorMask and is also the author of nationally bestselling, critically acclaimed, and award-winning novels and short stories for adults as well as the Sandman series of graphic novels and other graphic novels, including the graphic novel adaptation of CORALINE. Among his many awards are the World Fantasy Award, the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, and the Bram Stoker Award. Originally from England, Gaiman now lives in the United States. Visit him online at www.mousecircus.com.

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  Other Books by

  NEIL GAIMAN

  Coraline

  M Is for Magic

  Stardust

  Illustrated Books

  The Dangerous Alphabet

  MirrorMask

  The Wolves in the Walls

  The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish

  Credits

  Jacket art © 2008 by Dave McKean

  Copyright

  THE GRAVEYARD BOOK. Text Copyright © 2008 by Neil Gaiman. Illustrations Copyright © 2008 by Dave McKean. “Graveyard” lyrics by Tori Amos, copyright © 2001, used by permission, courtesy of Sword & Stone, Inc (ASCAP). All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

  Mobipocket Reader August 2008 ISBN 978-0-06-170939-5

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