When I Finally Closed the Last Page of This
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— A U T H O R B I O — — R E A D A L I K E S — Neil Gaiman was born in Hampshire, UK, and Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury now lives in the United States near Minneapolis. A self-described "feral child who was raised in libraries," Gaiman credits librarians with fostering a life-long love of Story of two young boys who begin reading: "I wouldn't be who I am without to encounter evil secrets when a libraries. I was the sort of kid who devoured lightning rod salesman gives them books, and my happiest times as a boy were one of his contraptions covered when I persuaded my parents to drop me off in the local with mystical symbols. library on their way to work, and I spent the day there." Neil Gaiman is credited with being one of the creators of modern comics, as well as an author whose work crosses genres and reaches audiences of all ages. Gaiman has achieved cult status and attracted increased media The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly attention. Gaiman is the New York Times bestselling author of the novels for adults , Neverwhere (1995), Stardust (1999), the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning American Gods (2001), Anansi Boys (2005), and Good High in his attic bedroom, twelve- Omens (with Terry Pratchett, 1990), as well as the short story year-old David mourns the death of collections Smoke and Mirrors (1998) and Fragile Things his mother. He is angry and alone, (2006). There is an HBO series in the works for American with only the books on his shelf for Gods. company. But those books have begun to whisper to him in the Gaiman wrote the screenplay for the original BBC TV series darkness, and as he takes refuge in of Neverwhere (1996); feature film, Mirrormask (2005); and his imagination, he finds that reality cowrote the script to Robert Zemeckis's Beowulf. He and fantasy have begun to meld. “When I finally closed the produced Stardust; written and directed two films: A Short Film About John Bolton (2002) and Sky Television’s last page of this slim volume Statuesque (2009). An animated feature film based on Gaiman's Coraline, secured a BAFTA for Best Animated Film The Crane Wife by Patrick Ness it was with the realization and was nominated for an Oscar in the same category. (Source: Neilgaiman.com, 2016) that I’d just finished one of A magical novel, based on a those uncommon perfect Japanese folk tale, that imagines how the life of a broken-hearted books that come along all man is transformed when he rescues an injured white crane that too rarely in a reader’s life.” has landed in his backyard. -Charles DeLint Fanart by olgakattg on DeviantArt—Ursula Monkton (Source: NoveList Plus, 2016) — D I S C U S S I O N Q U E S T I O N S — — S U M M A R Y — 1) It would be easy to think of the Hempstocks as the In Sussex, England, a middle-aged man returns to his "triple goddess" (the Maiden, the Mother, and the 9) One of the many motivators for the characters in this childhood home to attend a funeral. Although the house Crone) of popular mythology. In what ways do they story is loneliness. What characters seem to suffer from he lived in is long gone, he is drawn to the farm at the conform to those roles? In what ways are they loneliness? How do adults and children respond to end of the road, where, when he was seven, he different? loneliness in different ways? In the same ways? encountered a most remarkable girl, Lettie Hempstock, and her mother and grandmother. He hasn't thought of 2) The narrator has returned to his hometown for a 10) The narrator tells us that his father often burnt their Lettie in decades, and yet as he sits by the pond (a pond funeral (we never learn whose funeral). Do you think toast and always ate it with apparent relish. He also tells us that she'd claimed was an ocean) behind the that framing his childhood story with a funeral gives this that later in life, his father admitted that he had never ramshackle old farmhouse, the unremembered past story a pessimistic outlook, rather than optimistic one? actually liked burnt toast, but ate it to avoid waste, and that comes flooding back. And it is a past too strange, too his father's confession made the narrator's entire childhood frightening, too dangerous to have happened to 3) Because the narrator is male and most of the other feel like a lie: "it was as if one of the pillars of belief that my characters are female, this story has the potential to world had been built upon had crumbled into dry sand." anyone, let alone a small boy. become a stereotypical narrative where a male What other "pillars of belief" from childhood does he character saves the day. How does it avoid that pitfall? discover to be false? How do these discoveries affect him? Forty years earlier, a man committed suicide in a stolen Are there any beliefs from your own childhood that you car at this farm at the end of the road. Like a fuse on a 4) The story juxtaposes the memories of childhood with discovered to be false? firework, his death lit a touch paper and resonated in the present of adulthood. In what ways do children unimaginable ways. The darkness was unleashed, perceive things differently than adults? Do you think 11) When the narrative returns to the present, Old Mrs. something scary and thoroughly incomprehensible to a there are situations in which a child's perspective can be Hempstock tells our narrator, "You stand two of you lot next little boy. And Lettie—magical, comforting, wise beyond more "truthful" than an adult's? to each other, and you could be continents away for all it her years—promised to protect him, no matter what. means anything.” What does she mean by this? Why is it 5) Do you believe the supernatural events actually "easier" for people, our narrator especially, to forget certain A groundbreaking work from a master, The Ocean at the happened, or were they a part of the narrator’s things that are difficult to reconcile? End of the Lane is told with a rare understanding of all imagination? Are there times when storytelling that makes us human, and shows the power of stories captures the emotional truth of an event more 12) Though the narrator has a sister, he doesn't seem to be to reveal and shelter us from the darkness inside and accurately than a realistic narration of facts? particularly close to her. Why do you think it is that he has out. It is a stirring, terrifying, and elegiac fable as trouble relating to other children? Why do you think his delicate as a butterfly's wing and as menacing as a knife 6) One of Ursula Monkton's main attributes is that she sister is not an ally for him? in the dark. always tries to give people what they want. Why is this not always a good thing? What does Ursula want? How 13) Lettie tells the narrator, “Sometimes monsters are does Ursula use people's desires against them to get things people should be scared of, but they aren’t.” What is what she wants? something that you think people should be more afraid of than they are? 7) After the hunger birds leave, the narrator reflects: “I thought about my heart, then; wondered if there was a 14) When the Hempstocks snip out the narrator’s memory cold fragment of a doorway inside it still, and if it was a of being abused by his father, he pauses before destroying gift or a curse if there was.” In your opinion, would the scrap containing the memory and says, “I want to having a piece of a doorway inside of his heart be a remember. Because it happened to me. And I’m still me.” If blessing or a curse? you had the ability to “snip out” a painful memory from your own life, would you do it? Should we try to forget bad 8) Water has many roles in this story—it can give and memories, or try to remember them? take life, reveal and hide. How does it play these different roles? (Source: LitLovers.com & HarperCollins, 2016) (Source: Goodreads.com, 2016) .