As an inveterate Gaiman fan and a father who enjoys reading odd tales to my children [note to those of you who recommended it — we gave up on Lemony Snicket in disgust…] , I’m thrilled that Neil Gaiman‘s children’s book Coraline is out today. Here is a mini-review from the weblog of Jonathan Strahan, editor of Locus:

This is just nifty. It’s a 30,000 word short novel that tells of a young girl, Coraline, who moves into an odd old apartment with her distracted and much-too-busy parents. There are eccentric neighbours upstairs and downstairs, and a door in the living room that leads to nowhere (it was bricked up when the house was subdivided into apartments). Of course, the door does open, and into a place of threatening strangenesses where Coraline will encounter her “other mother”. Gaiman clearly knows what he’s doing here. His story telling voice is perfect (Gaiman often relates in his online diary how he regularly reads stories to his youngest daughter), and the story of a brave young girl overcoming incredible obstacles is the stuff of classics. I doubt I could be more impressed.

BTW, esteemed sci-fi writer John Shirley reviews Minority Report in Locus:

It must be both heaven and hell to master something this big, and it must happen all too rarely — yet Spielberg has done it. Oh there are flaws in the film, but not fatal ones…

And the enticing part:

The metaphysical hints and suggestions in Minority Report — rather like certain episodes of the The X-Files — are tantalizing, hinting of a spiritual, or at least a more psychically inclusive reality. Rightly, they are not deeply explored; they are a kind of background luminosity, only slightly more sharply seen here than in the real world.