LoveReading Says
LoveReading Says
Grown from an original idea by Siobhan Dowd and beautifully illustrated by Jim Kay, Patrick Ness’s extraordinary A Monster Calls has already won numerous awards and earned universal praise. There is now a major film coming and this is the tie-in. So I’ve come to this shamefully late and can only confirm that it deserves every award, every word of praise. Written for any reader this is a truly universal story of stubborn love, terrible loss and wild magic. Books rarely make me cry but I was often in tears reading this book.
It tells the story of Conor, a school boy whose mother is ill with cancer, whose father has left, whose grandmother is forbidding. He is defensive, angry and lonely at school. And then one night a monster calls – a massive walking and talking tree who takes Conor on a terrifying journey. But little is as it first seems in this story. And it is stories that become the lifeblood of this novel. Wild stories that tell the truth. Ness is brilliant at giving the reader room to feel for themselves the pain of his characters – he doesn’t direct you he just shows you what is happening and trusts you to empathise. This story is heartbreaking, profoundly scary yet also wildly affirming about the power of truth, friendship and love. If you grew up thrilling to the darkness of Dahl, enjoyed the humanity of Mark Haddon’s books this is for you. But really I think this is for everyone. It’s just superb.
If you’re intrigued by how the book became the film, this is a gorgeous illustrated hardback of the novel complete with added interviews with author, illustrator director and cast and photos from the production. ~ Simon Spanton
Click here to view the paperback movie tie-in edition of A Monster Calls.
Simon Spanton
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A Monster Calls (Movie Tie-in) Synopsis
The bestselling novel about love, loss and the power of story-telling from the twice Carnegie Medal-winning Patrick Ness, soon to be a major motion picture. Conor has the same dream every night, ever since his mother first fell ill, ever since she started the treatments that don't quite seem to be working. But tonight is different.
Tonight, when he wakes, there's a visitor at his window. It's ancient, elemental, a force of nature. And it wants the most dangerous thing of all from Conor.
It wants the truth. Patrick Ness takes the final idea of the late, award-winning writer Siobhan Dowd and weaves an extraordinary and heartbreaking tale of mischief, healing and above all, the courage it takes to survive.
Winner of the Red House Children's Book Award 2012.
Winner of the Galaxy Children's Book of the Year Award 2011
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9781406376524 |
| Publication date: |
6th October 2016 |
| Author: |
Patrick Ness |
| Publisher: |
Walker Books Ltd |
| Format: |
Paperback |
| Primary Genre |
Young Adult Fiction
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| Recommendations: |
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Author
About Patrick Ness
Patrick Ness was born on an army base called Fort Belvoir, near Alexandria, Virginia, in the United States. His father was a drill sergeant in the US Army. He lived in Hawaii until he was almost six, spent the ten years after that in suburban Washington state, and then on to Los Angeles, where he studied English Literature at the University of Southern California.
His main job after graduating was as corporate writer at a cable company, writing manuals, form letters and speeches and once even an advertisement for the Gilroy, California Garlic Festival (this is true). If you're American and hated your cable company, he probably wrote you a letter of apology.
He got his first story published in Genre magazine in 1997 and was working on his first novel when he moved to London in 1999. He's lived here ever since. Sometimes he teaches creative writing but mostly he tries to write 1,000 words a day, 'come hell or high water'.
In May 2008, he published The Knife of Never Letting Go, his first book for young adults. It won the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize and the Booktrust Teenage Prize and he hasn't looked back since. Click here to read a Q&A with Patrick.
10 Things You Didn't Know About Patrick Ness
1. He has a tattoo of a rhinoceros.
2. He has run two marathons.
3. He is a certified scuba diver.
4. He wrote a radio comedy about vampires.
5. He has never been to New York City but...
6. He has been to Sydney, Auckland and Tokyo.
7. He got accepted into film school but turned it down to study writing.
8. He was a goth as a teenager (well, as much of a goth as you could be in Tacoma, Washington and still have to go to church every Sunday).
9. He is no longer a goth.
10. Under no circumstances will he eat onions.
Author photo © Helen Giles
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