Coraline by Neil Gaiman is a children’s magical book. It’s about a little girl named Coraline who finds another world the same way Dorothy finds Oz or Alice finds Wonderland. The difference between the world that Coraline lives in and in the world that she discovers perfect for her.
At first, she gets to eat whatever she wants to eat. She gets to play with fun toys, and she gets to do whatever she wants to do. She has people around her who love her, appreciate her, and don’t get her name wrong. In the other world, in particular, her parents are perfectly willing to spend time with her anytime she wants them to spend time with her.
But it becomes clear throughout the novel that all of this world is strictly from the imagination of one particular being who wants to keep Coraline for herself. She has to fight her way out of the paper world, and the way she goes about this reads a lot like a video game. If you want to read like Coraline, keep scrolling.
5 Books Like Coraline (Magical Adventure)
In the book, Coraline does everything that she needs to do. She fights her way out of the paper world. She allegedly accomplishes her task, but the story is not done yet, and she even says at one point.
The message of this story is ultimately to tell us that the perfect paper world that children imagine for themselves is a lie. It doesn’t exist, but there is plenty of good to be had in an imperfect world, and kids don’t want a perfect world. I will review 5 books similar to Coraline. Let’s go!
1. Flunked (Fairy Tale Reform School)
This is the first one in a series, and it is called the Fairy Tale Reform School. It is set in an enchanted world where fairy tales’ villains and characters are not necessarily evil. But they’re not necessarily good, either. They are sent to this school to be reformed, and Flora, the stepmother from Cinderella, runs the school.
We follow a young girl called Gilly who has been caught feeding because her family is quite big. They live in a boot. Times are hard. Her dad is a shoemaker. He’s not bringing in as much money as they used to. So Gilly feels the need to go and steal things.
She admits to only stealing from the royals because they can afford to lose things, which is slightly a moral high ground. But as he’s caught and she’s sent to the school. She’s more concerned about getting out as quickly as possible to get back to her family to ensure they are being fed. That’s her main priority in life, making her quite a likable character.
This is a very entertaining children’s story, set in a school, in a fairy tale world, and all your classic princesses are there. There is Cinderella, Snow White, Rapunzel, and they’re all there. Then there are the more obscure fairy tale characters like the big bad wolf from Red Riding Hood. But they also have the Pegasus stables outside, and you can go flying on Pegasus. So I would highly recommend Flunked after Coraline, particularly for younger readers.
Author: Jen Calonita
Average Customer Review: (4.6 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Children’s Folk Tales & Myths
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | MP3 CD
2. The Wishing Spell (The Land of Stories)
Like Coraline, the book is about fairy tale retellings and twins. Alex and Connor Bailey were given a book called The Land of Stories, and the book is mysterious and an obvious plot device. They enter the book one day and enter a realm of fairy tales where sleeping beauty Aurora goes to sleep, where all of these fairy tale characters exist in one plane of existence. That is the premise of this book.
What follows after is the Queen’s Quest in their bid to exit the world? Chris Colfer does a wonderful job merging all of these stories, providing the historical background and the politics of all the countries. This premise had a lot of potential.
In the beginning, there’s a character called Mrs. Peters. She is an English teacher, and she was teaching fairy tales. She scolded the class for having the wrong interpretation of the morals of any fairy tales they were discussing. She tells them to go home and write an essay about the correct moral interpretation of the story and the fairy tale.
This book is 438 pages long. It is about Alex and Connor wanting to get out of a blend of stories, and they encounter obstacles along the way. But somehow, every single time, for every single obstacle, they manage to get out of the situation unchanged, and the villains let them go without any repercussions.
In the very beginning, they encounter the witch from Hansel and Gretel. Alex convinces the witch that a law in the land of stories requires her to grant them a wish before she needs them. So what is the wish that Connor wants the witch to grant them?
Author: Chris Colfer
Average Customer Review: (4.8 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Fairy Tales, Folk Tales & Myths, Action & Adventure Fantasy
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Audio CD
3. Matilda
This is a children’s classic, and it has many illustrations to read and see. This book starts with a four-year-old girl named Matilda Wormwood, a genius. She gets to discover later on as we read the book further. Her parents do not give her that love and care, and her parents are so self-obsessed. They give all their love and education to her elder brother, Michael.
A girl should pay attention to her looks because her looks will eventually decide what husband she’ll get in her later years of life. She should not pay more attention to her education, which is a philosophy with which Matilda disagrees.
So she starts educating herself by reading books and going to a public library daily. There’s a period in her home where nobody is at home for three to four hours. So she walks by herself to a public library nearby, and she starts picking up books and starts reading herself.
Matilda is the most intelligent child in her classroom. She is way ahead of all of her classmates and her class teacher. Miss Honey discovers that, and she wants her to escalate to a higher class. Again, we have an evil character, which is her principal, Miss Trunchbull.
So Miss Trunchbull disagrees with escalating Matilda to her class, and she is constantly tormenting Matilda and all of the other kids because she hates little children.
There is the angle of friendship. So Matilda is friends with Lavender, who is almost like Matilda. There’s also a magical twist at the end related to Miss Honey, Miss Trunchbull, and Matilda, which is very interesting to read like Coraline.
Author: Roald Dahl
Average Customer Review: (4.8 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Fantasy & Magic Fiction
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Audio CD
4. Peter Pan
It is the story of this eternally youthful young boy named Peter Pan. He lives in a world of Neverland, where he never has to grow up. One day, he flies into the siblings’ lives, Wendy, Michael, and John, taking them off to Neverland. They have all fun adventures.
Two characters, in particular, are exciting and complex. One was Captain Hook, the bad guy always portrayed as the bad guy and usually portrayed as a comic bad guy. But J.M. Barrie makes Captain Hook out to be sympathetic in a way. He’s still a pirate and a bad guy, but he has some sympathy associated with him.
We see this in the last chapter he’s in, especially where he becomes obsessed with maintaining good form. It doesn’t understand how Peter Pan can maintain good form. Yet, he has difficulty with it. This thought haunts him so much that he enables Peter Pan not to maintain good condition.
Peter Pan himself dives into the psychological drama of this character, the idea of being this eternally youthful child and never growing up. Most visual adaptations are more of a hero than the eternally young hero, similar to Coraline.
Author: James Matthew Barrie
Average Customer Review: (4.5 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Fiction Classics & Fantasy
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Mass Market Paperback
5. James and the Giant Peach
This book has large illustrations that go through the entire page. One of the things you will love about Roald Dahl’s books is how he’s so imaginative. He thinks of these wild and crazy things, and he writes so charmingly, and all of the things he thinks of are so quirky that you’re enchanted.
So this is the story of a little boy called James, and he’s an orphan. He lives with his two old aunts. One, an older man gives him a bag full of magical, tiny little wiggly green things and tells them that magical things will happen.
James loses his little bag of green things, and the green things go scattering across in the dirt and disappear. He thinks that he’s lost it forever. But then it turns out that little green things went into a peach tree, and a giant peach started to grow.
He discovers an entrance into the peach, and on the inside, he makes some new friends with a bunch of life-sized bugs. With his newfound friends, James takes off on many madcap adventures. He learns to trust his new friends and himself. Also, he discovers that he’s a great person on his own and that people care about him and people want to be his friend. If you like Coraline, you must read it.
Author: Roald Dahl
Average Customer Review: (4.8 out of 5, on Amazon)
Category: Animal Action & Adventure
Available: Audiobook | Paperback | Hardcover | Kindle | Mass Market Paperback
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