Actually, it was me who did that, and I stole that aspect of Coraline from my son, Mike, when he was young, and still called Mikey. If ever I made anything adventurous he’d shake his head and say, “Dad, you’ve made a recipe, haven’t you?” and he’d head off to the freezer compartment to find a box of microwaveable french fries.
Whenever we’d go out to eat he’d order peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, until one day a waiter persuaded him to explore the rest of the menu, and he’s never looked back.
How did you deal with long, boring, rainy days during the school holidays?
Well, on the good ones I’d get someone to drop me off at the local library, and I’d read. On the bad ones I’d stare out of the window and wonder what to do, and eventually wind up rereading the Narnia books.
What was the door that you were most scared to go through?
Well, Coraline’s door really was in the “drawing room” of our house. The house, long since knocked down, had been divided into two, and behind the door at the far end of the room was a red-brick wall. I was never certain there would always be a brick wall there, though.
Are things really magical, or do you make them magical by believing in them?
I think most things are pretty magical, and that it’s less a matter of belief than it is one of just stopping to notice.
What is the biggest key you have on your key ring and what does it open?
When I was a boy I collected keys, for no real reason I could explain, and somewhere in the attic I still have a box filled with them, keys of all sizes and shapes and designs.
There aren’t any fun ones on the everyday key ring, though: the biggest opens the cabin, overlooking a lake, where I go and write each day. The cabin doesn’t have a phone, which helps.
What chocolate do you eat first if you’re given a whole box?
In a perfect world, I would first identify the chocolates from the Identify Your Chocolate guide and eat something with a name like “Caramel Surprise.” In the real world, I tend normally to accidentally pull out the chocolate truffles. By the way, I cannot see the point of “tangerine cremes.”
Why do the batteries in things always run out just when you really need them?
It’s one of the rules. I don’t try to explain them. I just live here.
Did you let your children read Coraline before anyone else?
Well, I read it to Maddy, who was six when I finished it; and I forgot to give it to Holly (who is sixteen), so she just read it. “I hope you weren’t too old for it,” I told her, when she was done. “I don’t think you can be too old for Coraline,” she said, which made me very happy.
What is your favorite time of day?
Really, really early in the morning, just as the sun is coming up. I don’t see it too often, but I love it when I do.
Have you ever had your fortune told?
Once, while waiting for a theater to open in New York, by an old woman. She told me I would die on an island. It hasn’t happened yet.
Will there be a film of Coraline?
Quite possibly. The film rights have been bought, and Henry Selick, who is most famous for directing The Nightmare Before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach, has written the script and plans to direct it.
So many of my stories have been bought by Hollywood that I’ve long since stopped expecting any of them actually to happen, and will simply be pleasantly surprised if any of them actually do.
Will you write another children’s book?
Yes. The next one I want to write has a working title of The Graveyard Book.
A NOTE ON WORKING WITH
DAVE McKEAN
I’VE KNOWN DAVE MCKEAN for hundreds of years now. Almost twenty, anyway. When we met I was a young journalist, and he was an even younger art student.
We’ve made comics together (Black Orchid, Mr. Punch, Violent Cases, Signal to Noise). He did the covers for the Sandman comics and books (collected in a book called Dustcovers). We’ve done a children’s picture book (The Day I Swapped My Dad for 2 Goldfish), which proved so popular in certain quarters that Dave redid the book cover as a CD cover, and it was on the side of buses all over the world. We have another picture book, called The Wolves in the Walls, which will come out when Dave finishes the drawings.
This is why Dave McKean has illustrated Coraline.