Bones On The Surface by Joshua J. Johnson: Blog Tour– Day 2
Synopsis: Bones, the skeleton, is bored of being in the Death Room — a lively room underneath a graveyard with coffins lining the walls and squashy, red couches. The trouble is… skeletons are forbidden from leaving. One day, Bones and his best friend — Rattles — escape from the Death Room. Where will they go and what will they do? Will Bones ever be able to accept his place in life?
First of all, thank you to Ann for hosting me on her blog! 
This is the second stop on my debut book blog tour, in which I’ve been discussing the story behind BONES ON THE SURFACE.
BONES ON THE SURFACE is both my debut book, and my debut middle grade book. Following two skeletons who go by the name Bones and Rattles, who escape a lively room underneath a cemetary with coffins lining the walls and squashy, red couches in the middle.
It is in this blog post that I’ll be discussing the characters and the world of the book. The Death Room, as just said, is a lively room underneath a cemetery. It’s the home of the skeletons, and it’s a parody of the Living Room that living human beings have. as it says in the book, it isn’t supposed to be scary, but rather, a fun, homely, and cosy place to live.
I don’t really know where the idea for the Death Room came to me, but it’s definitely one the most vivid imaginary settings I’ve had. In BONES ON THE SURFACE, references to other Death Rooms and other places underneath other cemeteries around the world are made, although you never get to see any others within this book. In the original draft, you did, but it got cut out. If BONES ON THE SURFACE ever gets a sequel, one aspect that I would love to write is other places within that world.
The storyline to BONES ON THE SURFACE, obviously, is Bones– the main character– and his skeleton friend, Rattles– escaping the Death Room onto the surface of the Earth where their adventure takes place. Therefore, the Death Room needed a secret escape route. This was very fun to create, and it took several attempts to write in something that works. However, I’m not going to say where/what the escape route is, because that would be spoilery!
Of course, the characters in this book are skeletons: Bones and Rattles. Other skeletons are Ribs, Kneecaps, Sockets, One Arm, and more! These characters were enjoyable to write, and frequently play-on-words were able to make their way in the writing. Each skeleton is named after ‘skeletal’ terminology, and these characters are definitely my favourite out of all of my books. None of them were hard to write, and giving each one their own characterises that could be linked to their names proved to by entertaining!
The way that the characters and the world of BONES ON THE SURFACE work together made the idea fun to explore, and it makes me so happy to finally be able to share that world, because now my world is our world, and my characters are our characters.
So, if you wish to purchase the book and meet Bones and Rattles and the Death Room yourself, please follow the links below.
Thank you!
Available in both paperback and ebook, as well as on all other Amazons.
Joshua J. Johnson is an author who lives on the East Coast of England. He began writing books after he learned that they don’t just randomly appear on the shelf, but rather people actually sit down and write them. When he isn’t writing his next novel, he enjoys reading, watching How To Train Your Dragon, and drinking milkshakes. He is also the author of BONES ON THE SURFACE, as well as the upcoming YA novels SOULLESS, THE SWEET LIFE, and THEIR TIME TO GO. You can find out more about him at joshuajstories.wordpress.com or follow him on Twitter @JoshuaJAuthor.