Where Every Scroll is a New Adventure
To my tiny beanie baby self, who smiles at cats and loses a tooth by biting cotton candy. You don’t understand why things have happened the way they do, and neither do I, but maybe the words of this trusted adult will help ❣️
Mr. Gaiman, I know you mostly get asks about Good Omens these days, but I am a long-time fan. Of your work Coraline. I am a survivor of severe parental neglect and abuse, and I must have read the book hundreds of times in my childhood and I found great comfort in the movie, despite my now complicated feelings about Time Burton as a person. I guess I just wanted to thank you for creating a piece of art that made me feel less alone in my very isolated adolescence.
Do you have any advice for healing after such a traumatic start to life?
I'm glad Coraline has helped. (Tim Burton didn't have anything at all to do with the Coraline movie though.)
When I was young I believed that the way you healed was just to move on. Now I'm 63 and you realize that stuff never heals on its own. It's still there, waiting to jump out at you. But there are things that help: other people help, especially other people it's safe to talk to. Building a life can help. And making art out of trauma. That's good too.
I wished Coraline had been around when I was a child, and that was why I wrote it as an adult.