50 Fun Facts About The Graveyard Book

Which classic did Neil Gaiman rework as the tale of Nobody Owens, with ghosts replacing animals?

The Jungle Book gave Gaiman his template: Mowgli grows up among jungle animals, Bod among the dead, and some chapters mirror Kipling's stories one for one.

In The Graveyard Book, what is Bod's guardian hinted to be, though the novel never says so?

A vampire is the clear implication: he casts no reflection, sleeps in a steamer trunk and takes a bat-like form, yet the text never names what he is.

In The Graveyard Book, what kind of creature is Bod's strict tutor Miss Lupescu revealed to be?

A werewolf, though her kind prefer the name Hounds of God: they see the change as a gift and will chase evildoers to the gates of Hell.

What was Neil Gaiman's young son riding in a cemetery when the idea for The Graveyard Book struck?

A tricycle: watching the boy pedal happily between the graves in 1985, Gaiman pictured a child raised among the dead, then took over twenty years to write the story.

Which top American prize for children's literature did Neil Gaiman win with The Graveyard Book?

Newbery Medal judges pick the year's most distinguished American children's book; it later took Britain's equivalent too, a double no book had managed before.

In The Graveyard Book, who becomes Bod's guardian, the only resident able to leave and fetch food?

Silas belongs to neither the living nor the dead, so he alone can walk out of the gates, and he promises to find a stand-in whenever he must travel.

In The Graveyard Book, which creatures with titles like duke and bishop drag Bod through a grave?

Ghouls promise him a life of feasting, but they mean to make him one of them or eat him, and only a lesson he had sulked through saves him.

In The Graveyard Book, which surname does the man Jack use while posing as a kindly neighbour?

Frost is the name he hides behind: as Mr. Jay Frost he has moved into the very house where he murdered Bod's family.

In The Graveyard Book, what does Bod's guardian hand him along with money when it is time to leave?

A passport in the name Nobody Owens is the parting gift: at about fifteen he is losing the power to see the dead, so he walks out to find the living world.

In The Graveyard Book, what do the living and the dead do together on the night of the Macabray?

Dance is all they do until the clock strikes twelve again, and by morning the living remember nothing while the dead refuse to speak of it.

In The Graveyard Book, which living girl befriends the young Bod while her parents read nearby?

Scarlett moves away to Scotland soon after, then returns as a teenager and stumbles back into the cemetery after catching the wrong bus.

Which privilege from the dead lets Nobody Owens walk through walls in Neil Gaiman's novel?

Freedom of the Graveyard also lets him see in the dark, but it works only inside the gates and ebbs away as he grows up.

In The Graveyard Book, what do the parents of Bod's young playmate assume that Bod must be?

A friend she invented is what they take Bod for, so they keep bringing her to play among the graves without knowing who she meets there.

In which country is the hilltop cemetery where Bod grows up in The Graveyard Book?

England is the setting: the dead include a Roman who reached Britain a hundred years after the first of his people, and one tomb is older than the Celts.

In The Graveyard Book, what are Nick Farthing and Mo Quilling, whom Bod decides to scare?

School bullies who film younger pupils shoplifting and then blackmail them for their money; standing up to the pair costs Bod his anonymity.

In The Graveyard Book, what does Bod's guardian use, alongside alphabet books, to teach him to read?

Gravestones become his primer: he copies their inscriptions letter by letter, and he is busy doing so when a living girl first speaks to him.

In The Graveyard Book, which ability taught by Mr. Pennyworth lets Bod slip from people's notice?

Fading makes him invisible only while nobody is paying attention, and he struggles with it until a witch's spell makes it work.

In The Graveyard Book, what convinced the Jacks of All Trades that the infant Bod had to die?

An ancient prophecy said a boy would bring about the end of their order; by killing his family they set that very ending in motion.

In The Graveyard Book, what does Bod trick the man Jack into declaring himself to the Sleer?

Its master is what the Sleer has awaited for thousands of years, so it wraps him in its coils and pulls him into the rock to keep him forever.

Which British prize for children's writing did The Graveyard Book add to its top American award?

Carnegie Medal judges made it the first title to hold both that prize and its American counterpart, and the UK children's edition was shortlisted for its pictures too.

In The Graveyard Book, which witch buried without a headstone casts the spell that frees Bod?

Liza Hempstock was drowned and burned as a witch and laid in unhallowed earth, which is why she, unlike the other ghosts, can follow Bod beyond the gates.

In The Graveyard Book, which figure comes for every person at the moment they die?

The Lady on the Grey also settles the quarrel over baby Bod by urging the dead to be charitable, and years later she promises him a ride on her horse one day.

In The Graveyard Book, what does Bod paint with initials to serve as the witch's missing headstone?

A glass paperweight from the antiques shop where he was held prisoner does the job, after his plan to buy a real stone nearly got him sold to his family's killer.

In The Graveyard Book, which of the Sleer's treasures does Bod take to sell at an antiques shop?

The brooch, a huge red stone set in black metal worked into a snake-like creature, tugs at everyone who holds it, and its keeper warns that it always returns.

In The Graveyard Book, what name is given to the unconsecrated ground beyond the cemetery fence?

Potter's Field holds those once denied a churchyard grave, such as suicides and criminals, and its dead are not bound by the cemetery's rules.

In The Graveyard Book, what killed the villagers who watched the witch's execution a week earlier?

The plague arrived in a carpet sent from London and took everyone who had watched her die, and all of them went into one mass grave.

Which science fiction prize for Best Novel went to The Graveyard Book, a children's story?

Hugo Award voters at the World Science Fiction Convention chose it as Best Novel, while Locus readers named it their best young adult title.

In The Graveyard Book, which secret order protecting the borders of things includes Bod's guardian?

The Honour Guard spends years hunting the killers' brotherhood across the world, and the fight costs the life of one of Bod's teachers.

In The Graveyard Book, what does Bod's guardian take from the girl Bod hid during the final fight?

Her memories of that night are wiped after she brands Bod a monster for the way he beat the killer, and she and her mother are nudged into moving away.

In The Graveyard Book, what does Mrs. Owens begin on Bod's first night but finish only as he leaves?

A lullaby from her own childhood: on his first night she cannot recall how it ends, and the last line comes back to her only at the gates.

In The Graveyard Book, what does the man Jack find in the crib where he expected a sleeping toddler?

A teddy bear lies under his raised knife, because the restless toddler had already climbed out of the crib and wandered off up the hill.

In The Graveyard Book, how does the man Jack follow the missing baby from the house to the cemetery?

By his scent: the killer sniffs the air, memorises the child's milky smell and trails it out of the house and up the foggy hill.

In The Graveyard Book, what does a dark stranger persuade the man Jack he saw instead of a baby?

A fox, the stranger suggests, and the killer walks away believing it, with even their conversation gently removed from his mind.

In The Graveyard Book, which fruit unknown to the long-dead Mrs. Owens is baby Bod's first meal?

A banana is a fruit she has never seen before, and the guardian who fetched it has never eaten one himself.

In The Graveyard Book, what does Miss Lupescu make Bod learn to do in every language?

Call for help is the lesson he mocks, until he is carried off to another world and uses the cry of its winged beasts to summon his rescuer.

In The Graveyard Book, to which Scottish city does Bod's childhood playmate move with her parents?

Glasgow is where she grows up, and she is furious at being uprooted when her parents divorce and her mother brings her back at fifteen.

In The Graveyard Book, what blooms in the cemetery after eighty years to herald the Macabray?

White flowers appear overnight in winter, and custom has the mayor cut them and pin one on every person in the Old Town.

Which longtime Neil Gaiman collaborator illustrated the US edition of The Graveyard Book?

Dave McKean had painted the covers of Gaiman's Sandman comics and illustrated Coraline, and he also drew the UK edition aimed at adults.

Which stop-motion director did Disney hire in 2012 to bring The Graveyard Book to the screen?

Henry Selick had already filmed Gaiman's Coraline in stop-motion, but he and the studio parted ways within a year over scheduling and development.

Which instrument does Béla Fleck play on the audiobook of The Graveyard Book read by Neil Gaiman?

Banjo was Gaiman's own wish: he mused on his blog about a version of the audiobook's music with one in it, and Fleck read the post and sent a recording.

In The Graveyard Book, which winged beasts of a red-skied underworld answer Bod's cry for rescue?

Night-gaunts come from the dream tales of H. P. Lovecraft, whose work Gaiman drew on; in the novel they circle the skies above a hellish city and alert Bod's tutor.

In The Graveyard Book, which greedy antiques dealer locks Bod in a storeroom over a treasure?

Abanazer Bolger keeps a black-edged card left by the man Jack, and he wavers between chasing more treasure and handing the boy over.

In The Graveyard Book, under which Polish city do Bod's guardian and Miss Lupescu fight together?

Kraków hides the caves where they fight beside a winged mummy, and where the tutor, badly wounded, readies herself for a last stand.

Which future Children's Laureate illustrated the UK children's edition of The Graveyard Book?

Chris Riddell's drawings reached the Kate Greenaway shortlist, the first time one title had made the author and illustrator shortlists together.

Which veteran British actor narrates the 2014 full-cast audiobook of The Graveyard Book?

Derek Jacobi leads a cast that includes Miriam Margolyes as Mrs. Owens and Andrew Scott as the man Jack, and the recording won three Audie Awards.

In The Graveyard Book, which novel does Bod borrow from Thackeray Porringer, who punches him for it?

Robinson Crusoe was in the young ghost's hands when he died, and he prizes his copy so fiercely that he hits Bod even after getting it back.

Which Jack of All Trades in The Graveyard Book shares a name with a notorious real executioner?

Mr. Ketch borrows the name of Charles II's executioner, whose botched work made him a byword for the job; in the novel he stalks Bod with a silk cord.

In The Graveyard Book, which animal does the winged mummy Kandar carry into battle for luck?

A pig rides along as his lucky charm in the caves, to the open irritation of the tutor fighting beside him.

Why did Neil Gaiman wait over twenty years to write The Graveyard Book after having the idea?

He doubted his own skill: each time he returned to the story he judged himself not yet a good enough writer, until he finally finished it in 2008.

In The Graveyard Book, what does Bod eat on his first public outing with his guardian?

A pizza, though only Bod eats any of it: with the killers gone, it is finally safe for the two of them to be seen together.