Title: A Monster Calls Author: Patrick Ness
Published: May 5, 2011
Genre(s): Horror
Page Count: 206
Rating:
Summary from Goodreads:At seven minutes past midnight, thirteen-year-old Conor wakes to find a monster outside his bedroom window. But it isn't the monster Conor's been expecting—he's been expecting the one from his nightmare, the nightmare he's had nearly every night since his mother started her treatments. The monster in his backyard is different. It's ancient. And wild. And it wants something from Conor. Something terrible and dangerous. It wants the truth. From the final idea of award-winning author Siobhan Dowd—whose premature death from cancer prevented her from writing it herself—Patrick Ness has spun a haunting and darkly funny novel of mischief, loss, and monsters both real and imagined.
To properly review A Monster Calls might be an impossible endeavor. I, personally, don’t much feel up to the task. I’ve read Ness before, been blown away by his prose and his skills. But the sheer impact of this book is something I’m not used to dealing with. This book is dark and heavy, dealing with grief in a way that borders on the fantastic, yet is all the more authentic because of it.
The monster than Conor inadvertently calls is dark and menacing and not of this world, but it doesn’t scare Conor. Because that monster isn’t the worst thing out there, and as young as 13, Conor has learned that. The three tales the monster tells Conor are not simply bedtime stories; they have a purpose. Everything in A Monster Calls leads to a certain point. Even Jim Kay’s gorgeous, haunting illustrations drive the story toward its destination. At the end of all this, Conor must admit the truth—to the monster, and to himself—or else he’ll never escape his nightmares.
This book is dark—so very, very dark. And it’s dark not because of the monster who visits Conor at midnight, but because of what waits for him in the daytime. Ness makes the mundane tragedies of real life seem catastrophic, as they must be to anyone experiencing them firsthand, not simply reading about them or hearing about them from another. The pain Conor feels, and the ability the author has to highlight it and make it understandable to the reader—this is the true horror of A Monster Calls.
This is not a book that’s swallowed easily. It hurts, and it’s meant to. It makes the reader consider things from new angles, to sympathize with those we might never take notice of. A Monster Calls is not happy; it’s not pretty. This book doesn’t make its reader feel good—nor does it attempt to do so. It’s a building collection of raw emotion that grows until it’s too much. But it doesn’t erupt; it isn’t violent. Instead, A Monster Calls lets loose all its excess emotion in a steady, devastating stream that is gentle but heartbreaking. And at the end of it all, like Conor the reader grieves, but it is loss mingled with relief, knowing that the pain is at last, finally, over.
