Author: Patrick Ness
Publish Date: 27th September 2011
Published By: Walker Books
More Information: Goodreads | Amazon | Author
Publish Date: 27th September 2011
Published By: Walker Books
More Information: Goodreads | Amazon | Author
The monster showed up after midnight. As they do.
But it isn't the monster Conor's been expecting. He's been expecting the one from his nightmare, the one he's had nearly every night since his mother started her treatments, the one with the darkness and the wind and the screaming...
This monster is something different, though. Something ancient, something wild. And it wants the most dangerous thing of all from Conor.
It wants the truth.
How do we learn to accept the hard truths about ourselves? The people we fear to become if we whisper our secrets aloud?
It was an absolute pleasure to have my heart torn to shreds, page after page with this book. I'm being sincere. I am so overjoyed that I've found a new author to admire. When you thought you understood how the book was going to play out, Ness took several different paths to come to the truth of the book and the character's truths.
Since I am a spoiler-free blog, I can't say exactly why this book is an amazing example of it's genre - simply that what you are expecting is probably not what you're going to get. It's also a wonderfully original and crafted approach on a certain kind of book (again, another spoiler if I reveal what goes on it) that deserves to be read by everyone. Everyone. Ness' style is fantastic - the way he writes pulled me in immediately. He was able to set the tone of the book and consistently keep the same tone through his colourful use of metaphors. The way Ness tells this story is fantastic. A story within a story within a story. (Storyception?) But don't let that turn you off - this is all about Conor's life and is related to it.
Conor himself was a hard character to like, but we were reminded of what he was dealing with. It wasn't easy to read him distance himself from his only friend, and it wasn't easy to read him simply existing, like a ghost and wanting to be seen yet not wanting to be bothered. His mother was simply wonderful, and just that - a mother. His Grandmother was definitely a big surprise, though. She entered as a typical (or not so typical, depending on how you look at it) grandmother, wanting to hold onto her youth. Her development was one of my favourites, as by the end of the book I couldn't hate her for how she was, because everything she was feeling was mirrored in Conor's behaviour. This was such a subtle use of a doppelgänger, I didn't even realise that she may have been Conor's because of the link each had to his mother. Even Conor's absent father was hard to hate by the end of it; if there was one reason to dislike him, it was probably because he wasn't there at the end. But that's life; unexpected certainties.
I don't think I can say more to try and persuade you to read this book if you haven't without spoiling the whole thing. So if you can handle incredibly painful stories of youngsters and adults trying to deal with the real world and your emotions and your relationships and life in general, then please do yourself a favour and pick up this book. I am so happy I did. Ness is one to watch out for.
