The Graveyard Girl and the Boneyard Boy - Overview

In Martin Matthews’ young adult novel, “The Graveyard Girl And The Boneyard Boy,”  he treats readers to a compelling and eminently likable cast of characters. He displays a writing style that draws you in from the very first paragraph. Matthews is a great storyteller who spins an exciting, stirring, and accessible fantasy complete with a teenage romance that took me down memory lane to my first teenage romance.

Matthew uses the town of Centralia, Pennsylvania as the backdrop for his story. The real Centralia, Pennsylvania is an uninhabited town. It was evacuated years ago because of a  fire raging in a subterranean coal mine that spewed out noxious gas harmful to people. The Centralia Matthews writes about is a thriving community with a large high school, but it does share some of the issues the real town faced like clouds of toxic gas escaping from fissures in the ground. 

Drake Stevenson, the protagonist, is a young teen who is far from average. He is an albino or as he prefers“ a person with albinism” he has some issues that don’t exactly allow him to fit in. He has an older sister who is a constant antagonist. She also acts as if she might have some mental health issues or at least that is what it seems by some of the insane actions she takes to aggravate her brother. Occasionally she is a good sister, but not often. Unfortunately for Drake, his parents are not getting along either. His life is in turmoil and to top it off he has to go to a new school and dreads it.  To his utter amazement, he finds new friends, and one of them is a girl that he finds very, very interesting.

Drake’s family just returned to Centralia and will be living at the Hyacinth House and caring for the Centralia Cemetery. The Stevenson family had owned and operated the sprawling cemetery since the turn of the twentieth century. Drakes father thought he had escaped the family cemetery business years before by becoming a lawyer and moving to the big city, but a health scare has brought him back to what he thought would be a less stressful family business.

Drake and his new found love interest share a passion for exploring the deserted mines, and for a while, his life seems to be going well until he realizes the town has a secret that no one wants to talk about. His uneasiness increases even more after some conversations with a beautiful girl who appears to be connected to the mystery. Making matters worse is a particular bully at his new school who carries a gun and calls Drake the “boneyard boy.”  Matthews addresses many of the issues that teenagers face today in high school, guns, drinking, drugs,  and even tragic deaths. This is a book written for YA readers, but I think it’d be an enjoyable read for anyone. So, jump in and follow along as Drake tries to sort it all out.