Coraline is a fast pace, exciting and timeless fantasy novel written by Neil Gaiman in 2002. It has been acclaimed by many and has also won the top place on several ”Best Book”-lists. It’s popularity raised even more as it was adapted into animation in 2009. Coraline is relatively new novel even though it very much seems like an old classic for younger readers – despite modern technology is somewhat present in this book, such as television and computer are mentioned. However, I think that Coraline’s adventures are so peculiar that they aren’t bound with any period of time.
Coraline tells about a girl, after whom the book is entitled, who loves to explore and whose family has just moved to an old house devided into four apartments. On a rainy day, Coraline’s not allowed to play outside so she starts to explore the house instead. She counts all the doors, since her father advised her to. She finds a locked door which begins to interest her but as Coraline’s mother unlocks it, she sees that there’s only a brick wall behind. This doesn’t however kill her interest in it and as the story proceeds, Coraline finds that the brick wall has disappeared one night and there’s a long dark corridor opening in front of her. At the end of the corridor there’s another door which leads to a house, copy of her real home though not exactly identical – everything’s a tad bit better, or so does she think at first. Coraline meets her other mother and her other father who are like parents she has dreamed of. However, there’s a slite curiosity in her other parents – they have buttons sewn to their eyes. The other parents want Coraline to live with them instead of her real parents and sew buttons to her eyes as well. Coraline challanges the other mother to play a game in which Coraline has to find the lost souls of her parents or else she’ll lose her own soul to her other mother. But since the other mother is cruel and loves to win, she tries to cheat. Thus Coraline goes through a battle agains her and is confronted with challanges.
”Flee, while there’s still air in your lungs and blood in your vains and warmth in your heart. Flee while you still have your mind and soul.”
Who or more alarmingly what the other mother actually is, stays as a mystery. Why does she exist? Furthermore, the question why there is such a place in general where she lives, wont be solved.
The narrator in this book is non-participant and limited to the protagonist’s perspective. However, it doesn’t describe Coraline’s feelings and thoughts in detail or regard them as a crusial piece of information. This begs a question whether Coraline is actually so one-dimentional or is this just due to the minimalistic amount of images created from Coraline’s internal dynamics. This is probably why there wasn’t really a character I would’ve identified with.
Given the fact that the narrator makes Coraline maybe a bit ambiguous, the protagonist seems very baffled by the world around her; she doesn’t quite understand it but surprisingly she just acknowledges the weird occasions she experiences but never questions them outloud or demand anwers. Coraline is remote from other people and they all seem to live in their own worlds inside their heads; they’re isolated from each other – not concretely but as far as communication is concerned. Coraline asks something from her mother, for instance, but never gets an answer for the question she presented or, at least, nobody bothers to answer. This may cause annoyance among readers.
Although Coraline is a bit naive, she’s also very clever and I feel like sometimes the reason why she doesn’t bother to question things is just because she has more interesting things to do and see than look for answers for her astonishment from the people around her who probably don’t understand them either. Coraline turns out to very be brave for her age and can push herself to her limits when needed. In this sense, Coraline evolves as the story proceeds.
Although the book is pretty much a one-man show of Coralines, there’s also another character, a mysterious black cat, which involves her adventures. The cat, which I personally adored, is like Coraline’s helper; it advices her (yes, the cat can speak when it’s on ”the other side” of the house) and I feel like it supports her to be brave. It has always something unpredictable to say and kinda has its own laws – it may suddently disappear or emerge out of nowhere.
The book has a simple and clear storyline, and in my opinion, written only to be told, shared to the readers and nothing more. It has no filling. I was longing for the situations to be described and made more interesting through detailed text. Though, these aspects do sometimes occure but mostly when the book is alredy approaching it’s end. Events in this book are followed one after the other in a continuos pace. The story proceeds quickly and smoothly, but in my opinion, that sacrifices the aspects which bring dimension to the story, or else, the ever so unique and fascinating story stays muted and doesn’t really reach the point of greatness it has the potential for.
Coraline is an easy read since it’s for younger readers. Therefore, even though I’m tempted to say it was a bit of a disappointment, the not so winding language is expected – though I didn’t think it was going to be this easy. Also, books which evoke a wide spectrum of feelings and are multidimensional are usually the ones I prefer, but Coraline sadly didn’t have those aspects. The library didn’t have the books available I so wanted to read and some of the authors I was interested in were simply missing, such as Fitzgerald, Lockhart and Doerr. But if you’re looking for a thrilling, adventurous novel just to past the time, then Coraline could be for you. It’s also very likely to forgot that you’re reading this novel in english.