How to Sell a Haunted House

The Velveteen Rabbit is a classic children’s book. In it, a young boy is given a velveteen rabbit as a gift. Another toy tells the rabbit that if a child loves him enough, he will become real. When the boy becomes ill, the doctor orders that all of his toys be destroyed. The rabbit cries over his abandonment, and when his tear falls, the Nursery Magic Fairy appears and tells him that she can make him real. She takes him into the forest, where he changes into a real rabbit. The following spring, the boy sees the rabbit in the forest.

The Velveteen Rabbit appears as a motif very early on: Chapter 2 opens with an argument about it between Louise and Poppy. While Poppy loves the book, Louise hates it; it was a gift for Poppy from Nancy, who thinks that it is Louise’s favorite book. In fact, Louise was always terrified by it, and Nancy’s assertion that it was her favorite illustrates their difficulty connecting and their differences as parents, contributing to the theme of The Challenges of Mother-Daughter Relationships.

Hendrix uses The Velveteen Rabbit to parallel Louise’s own childhood experience with a toy that comes to life: Pupkin.