Coraline is best explained as a family horror story. By "family horror story," I don't mean it's a horror story about family -- although it certainly is that, too -- but rather that it's a horror story suitable for (older) children as well as adults of all ages.
It doesn't start out like a horror story. When we are first introduced to Coraline, her life is actually quite boring. She and her family have just moved to a new town, taking up residence in an ancient house known as the Pink Palace. They've got plenty of colorful neighbors, but no one that Coraline really feels she can be friends with -- and even her parents are too busy with their own tasks and concerns to pay her any attention.
But then Coraline discovers a tiny door in the wall, a door that takes her to a very different version of the Pink Palace. In this world, Coraline meets her Other Mother, a sweet and mischievous doppelgänger of Coraline's real mom. Unlike her real mom, though, the Other Mother always has time for Coraline, making up games and shows and favorite foods, all for Coraline's amusement. Even the neighbors are better.
The set-up is all very boilerplate, author Neil Gaiman's own fairytale version of Lucy in Narnia or Alice in Wonderland. But then the Other Mother offers Coraline a way to remain in this new, enchanting world forever -- and suddenly, Coraline finds herself no longer living in a dream world, but facing, and fighting, a monster.
The book was published in 2002, and went on to win both the Hugo and Nebula Awards for Best Novella. It was also released as a film in 2009, directed by Henry Selick (the director behind The Nightmare Before Christmas), and it was as a film that I first experienced the story. It's not a bad place to start; the movie is both a gorgeously-rendered (and brilliantly-acted) film in its own right, while also being spectacularly faithful to the book it's based on.
But however you choose to approach the story, what makes it so special is not the spine-chilling horror elements in and of themselves. Instead, it is in watching Coraline find the courage, determination, and resourcefulness necessary to defeat the darkness. It transforms Coraline from a heartless horror story into a Hero's Journey about facing the monsters and finding your courage. To borrow the quote that opened the book, observed by G.K. Chesterton (as paraphrased by Neil Gaiman):
It doesn't start out like a horror story. When we are first introduced to Coraline, her life is actually quite boring. She and her family have just moved to a new town, taking up residence in an ancient house known as the Pink Palace. They've got plenty of colorful neighbors, but no one that Coraline really feels she can be friends with -- and even her parents are too busy with their own tasks and concerns to pay her any attention.
But then Coraline discovers a tiny door in the wall, a door that takes her to a very different version of the Pink Palace. In this world, Coraline meets her Other Mother, a sweet and mischievous doppelgänger of Coraline's real mom. Unlike her real mom, though, the Other Mother always has time for Coraline, making up games and shows and favorite foods, all for Coraline's amusement. Even the neighbors are better.
The set-up is all very boilerplate, author Neil Gaiman's own fairytale version of Lucy in Narnia or Alice in Wonderland. But then the Other Mother offers Coraline a way to remain in this new, enchanting world forever -- and suddenly, Coraline finds herself no longer living in a dream world, but facing, and fighting, a monster.
The book was published in 2002, and went on to win both the Hugo and Nebula Awards for Best Novella. It was also released as a film in 2009, directed by Henry Selick (the director behind The Nightmare Before Christmas), and it was as a film that I first experienced the story. It's not a bad place to start; the movie is both a gorgeously-rendered (and brilliantly-acted) film in its own right, while also being spectacularly faithful to the book it's based on.
But however you choose to approach the story, what makes it so special is not the spine-chilling horror elements in and of themselves. Instead, it is in watching Coraline find the courage, determination, and resourcefulness necessary to defeat the darkness. It transforms Coraline from a heartless horror story into a Hero's Journey about facing the monsters and finding your courage. To borrow the quote that opened the book, observed by G.K. Chesterton (as paraphrased by Neil Gaiman):
"Fairy tales are more than true -- not because they tell us dragons exist, but because they tell us dragons can be beaten."
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