If you loved how Rudger could exist just out of sight in Amanda's ordinary world—and how that everyday setting turned uncanny once Mr. Bunting started hunting—then Coraline will hit the same sweet spot. You’ll slip with Coraline through a door in her flat into a too-perfect Other House, face the button‑eyed Other Mother, and feel that same eerie, real‑world chill you felt when Rudger was nearly unmade by being forgotten.

Like Amanda and Rudger’s small, private world—built in bedrooms, hospital corridors, and quiet corners—Skellig keeps the focus intimate. Michael finds a strange, fragile being in his garage and, with his neighbor Mina, tends to it in secrecy. If you were drawn to the hush of Amanda whispering with Rudger and the way their private bond shaped everything, you’ll love the tender, secret spaces of Michael’s discovery.

If Mr. Bunting’s quiet, relentless hunger for imaginaries gave you delicious shivers, The Night Gardener brings that same creeping dread. Orphans Molly and Kip take jobs at a crumbling manor where a sinister tree—and the mysterious man who tends it—feeds on wishes and lies. It’s the same goosebump‑raising menace that stalked Rudger, only now it haunts a whole house.

Part of the charm in The Imaginary is how the rules of imaginings—fading, believing, being hunted—feel magical without ever turning into a handbook. Doll Bones keeps that alluring ambiguity: Zach, Poppy, and Alice set out to lay a bone‑filled china doll—“the Queen”—to rest, guided by whispers and half‑believed signs. If you liked how Rudger’s world stayed wondrous and a little unknowable, this will scratch that same itch.

If the way Rudger fights fading—and the cost of being forgotten—left you teary, A Monster Calls delivers a similarly powerful release. Conor is visited by a great yew‑tree monster that tells him stories while his mum is ill, pushing him toward a truth he doesn’t want to face. Like Amanda and Rudger’s parting and reunion, it’s a cathartic, deeply felt journey about love, fear, and letting go.