Coraline Jones moves into a new apartment with her parents. As a curious and adventurous 11-year-old girl, Coraline quickly becomes bored of her new surroundings even though she has some eccentric neighbors to keep her company.
One rainy day, Coraline becomes interested in a strange door that opens up to a brick wall. The brick wall vanishes the next day and the door leads to a corridor. When Coraline explores it, she finds that on the other side is a parallel universe that is a mirror image of the one she just left behind. She finds an alternate version of her new home, inhabited by versions of her parents who call themselves her "Other Mother" and "Other Father". Her other parents are similar to her parents with one big difference: they have buttons for eyes.
Uncertain of her place and the safety of this new world, Coraline returns through the door. There she finds that her real parents have gone missing. She decides to go back to the parallel universe and look for them. Coraline recalls what bravery means by remembering a story of where her father rescued her from a swarm of wasps. Coraline undertakes several brave adventures in the Other Universe as she battles the evil Other Mother in a game to save herself, her parents, and more. She discovers strength within herself through these adventures.[7]
Characters
Coraline Jones is the main character. She is a curious, intelligent, resourceful, and courageous girl. Coraline is often irritated by rain, her "crazy" grown-up neighbors, and not being taken seriously because of her young age. She is described as being "small for her age".
Mel Jones is Coraline's mother. She is very busy most of the time, and sometimes inattentive, but she loves and cares about Coraline.
Charlie Jones is Coraline's father. He cares about Coraline very much and is kind, brave, and helpful. He makes "creative" food creations that Coraline strongly dislikes. He is usually found working at the house on his computer. He, like his wife, Mrs. Jones, is usually too busy to spend time with Coraline.
The Cat is a black cat from the real world. The cat acts as a mentor to Coraline and guides her through her journey. He is unnamed, as he explains that cats do not need names to tell each other apart, but the Other Mother refers to him as "Vermin". Unlike many of the characters in the novel, he does not have an "Other World" counterpart. He states that unlike other creatures in the world, cats can "keep themselves together." He moves freely from one world to the other and is capable of talking in the Other World. He has a sarcastic personality, constantly belittling Coraline, but befriends and helps her escape from the Beldam. He is defiant of the Other Mother, but trembles at the thought of being stuck in the Other World forever.
The Beldam (also known as The Other Mother) is the main antagonist of the novel. She is an evil, inhuman sorceress and the ruler of the Other World. In her first form, she looks similar to Coraline's real mother but taller and thinner, with long black hair that seems to move by itself, black button eyes, paper-white skin, and extremely long, twitchy fingers with long dark red nails. During the course of the novel, she grows taller, thinner, and paler, having little physical similarities to Coraline's mother by the end, suggesting she has the ability to metamorphose. She cannot create, but only copy, twist, and change things from the real world when constructing her version of it. She collects children, whom she loves possessively to the point of their eventual destruction, taking their souls so they cannot leave her world and caring for them until they pass away, but wanting to feel their happiness and joy afterwards.
The Other Father is one of the creations of the Beldam, in the image of Mr. Jones, the Other Father is used to help trick Coraline to stay in the Other World. Like her real father, he has a study and sits there during the day and will not talk to Coraline for long. He does not work, he merely occupies the study, and is not permitted to talk to Coraline without the Beldam's influence. He appears to be much more enjoyable than Coraline's real father and always tries to be cheerful and fun in front of Coraline. In reality, the Other Father is sad and somewhat nervous. The Beldam ends up punishing him for revealing too much to Coraline—she transforms him into a soft, doughy, grub-like creature, and orders the Other Father to trap Coraline so she cannot win her challenge. He voices his reluctance to harm her yet cannot refuse the Beldam's orders.
April Spink and Miriam Forcible are a pair of retired actresses who live in the flat under Coraline's. They own many agingScotties and talk in theater jargon, often referencing their glory days as actresses. In the Other World, they are youthful and perform continuously in front of anthropomorphic dogs.
Mr. Bobo is a retired circus performer living in the flat above Coraline's and is commonly referred to throughout the story as the "Crazy Old Man Upstairs". Over the course of the book, he claims to be training mice to perform in a mouse circus, and often brings Coraline messages from them. His Other World counterpart trains rats and is made of rats.
The Ghost Children are the spirits of three children, two girls and one boy, who were the previous victims of Beldam. The boy is described as having a dirty face and red trousers. One of the girls has brown hair, a pink blouse, and a pink skirt. The other has a brown bonnet and brown dress. They were trapped by the Beldam at different times before Coraline and reside in the dark space behind the mirror. After having their souls restored, they go to the afterlife.
With the help of the animation studio Laika, director Henry Selick released a stop motion film adaptation in 2009 that received much critical acclaim, and moderate box office success. At the 82nd Academy Awards, the film was nominated for Best Animated Feature but lost to Pixar's Up. Although the 2009 film has several differences, it still manages to hold relatively strong to the original plot of the book. In the film, Coraline is depicted as having short blue hair and freckles. In the movie, there was an added new character named Wyborn "Wybie" Lovat, a boy about Coraline's age who frequently annoyed Coraline at first, but over time, they grow on each other. In the Other World, his copy cannot speak but is an ally to Coraline, and gets punished by the Other Mother when he helps Coraline escape the Other World. At the end of the film, Coraline reaches out to help Wybie tell his grandmother what is behind the little door. The sister of Wybie's grandmother was one of the ghost children lost to the Beldam.
A theatrical adaptation, with music and lyrics by Stephin Merritt and book by David Greenspan, premiered on 6 May 2009, produced by MCC Theater and True Love Productions Off-Broadway at The Lucille Lortel Theatre.[9] Nine-year-old Coraline was played by an adult, Jayne Houdyshell, and the Other Mother was played by David Greenspan.[9]
Another theatrical adaptation, a stage opera by Mark-Anthony Turnage based on the novella, made its world premiere at the Barbican Centre in London on 27 March 2018.
A 2009 video game adaptation, based on the film, was published and developed by D3 Publisher of America. The game was released on 27 January 2009 for the PlayStation 2, Nintendo DS and Wii platforms and contains features such as playing as Coraline, interacting with other characters, and playing minigames. The game received mostly negative reviews, and little success.[11][12]
