Review by New York Times Review
WHEN I opened the envelope on my doorstep containing this book, I immediately had to sit down. "A Monster Calls" is about coming to terms with grief. And it is based on the last story idea from my first mentor: brassy, big-hearted Siobhan Dowd, then a human rights campaigner, who was kind - or crazy - enough to hire me as an intern in 1997 when I was 18 years old. She died four years ago from breast cancer at the age of 47. Along with my sadness and guilt - I learned of her death only by opening that envelope and, yes, I cried - came memories. There was Dowd's big desk at the PEN American Center. Her brilliant letters on behalf of authors imprisoned around the world. Her favorite places for dumplings in Chinatown. Her funny stories about busking in the London Tube for pub money, belting out a pop parody she called "House of the Writhing Nun." Both of us bent double with laughter. She was the kind of person who could turn a kid into a colleague. I suspect that's how she managed to reach so many young people. After two decades working in human rights, Dowd began writing novels for young adults. Two were released during her lifetime, starting with "A Swift Pure Cry" in 2006, and two, including "Bog Child," which won the Carnegie Medal in 2009, appeared posthumously. One story remained untold. Dowd had planted the seeds for a new project: an illustrated work about a yew tree with healing powers and a young boy coping with his mother's terminal cancer. After Dowd died, her editor shared the idea with Patrick Ness, author of the "Chaos Walking" trilogy. The two writers had never met, and their voices couldn't be more dissimilar. Could Ness finish what Dowd had begun? In lesser hands, that plan could have curdled into disaster: a literary ventriloquist's act or a campy tribute or the ugly stump of a story, straitjacketed by its originator's unknowable intentions. Thankfully none of that happened. Ness took the idea as a springboard, rather than as marching orders. The result is all his own, and it's powerful medicine: a story that lodges in your bones and stays there. It opens in England with Conor O'Malley, 13, a boy whose recurring dream always ends in terror: his mother slips from his grasp, lost forever. His waking life isn't much better. He's a piñata for bullies, an object of scrutiny for his bossy grandmother and mostly ignored by his father who lives in America with a new wife and baby. Meanwhile, Conor's mother is dying, and everyone at school knows it. Classmates give him a wide berth. Teachers address him in voices dripping with pity. So when a monster - a wild, elemental beast with the limbs of a yew tree - summons Conor from his bedroom window one night, the boy is nonplused. "Shout all you want," he replies, shrugging. "I've seen worse." In later visits, the monster tells Conor three parables. Unlike the traditional folktales whose form they echo, the monster's stories are messy. They're full of tough decisions, unexpected outcomes and imperfect characters beyond the neat archetypes of good and evil. Conor dreads what will happen after he hears the third and final story because the monster has warned him that when the telling is done, Conor must speak his own tale: "Not just any truth. Your truth." Otherwise, the beast will eat him alive. This is no minor threat. The towering monster and his ominous landscape are illustrated with appropriate menace by Jim Kay, whose hatch-marked, edgy illustrations give away - and conceal - just enough. But the monster isn't quite what Conor expected. And acknowledging his "truth," for all its weight, may be the key to more than just survival. There's no denying it: this is one profoundly sad story. But it's also wise, darkly funny and brave, told in spare sentences, punctuated with fantastic images ("Her scariest frown burnt into her face like a scar") and stirring silences. Past his sorrow, fright and rage, Conor ultimately lands in a place - an imperfect one, of course - where healing can begin. "A Monster Calls" is a gift from a generous storyteller and a potent piece of art. It's enough to make me wonder: How often does grief - and the balm to heal it - arrive packaged together so neatly in the same envelope, on the doorstep? Jessica Bruder teaches at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and is the author of "Burning Book."
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [October 16, 2011]
Review by Booklist Review
*Starred Review* After the stylistic feats and dumbfounding originality of Ness' Chaos Walking trilogy, this follow-up effort comes as something of a surprise an earthbound story concocted from a premise left behind by the late Siobhan Dowd. As Conor watches his mother succumb to cancer, he is pummeled by grief, anger, isolation, helplessness, and something even darker. At night, when he isn't trapped in a recurring nightmare too terrible to think about, he is visited by a very real monster in the form of a giant yew tree. The monster tells Conor three ambiguous, confusing stories, then demands a final one from the boy, one tha. will tell me your truth. Meanwhile, Conor's mom tears through ineffective treatments, and Conor simmers with rage. Everybody always wants to have a talk lately. But all that really happens is a lot of pussyfooting around the central, horrible fact that his mother is dying, and what does the monster mean abou. the trut. anyway? A story with such moribund inevitability could easily become a one-note affair or, worse, forgettable but small, surgically precise cuts of humor and eeriness provide a crucial magnifying effect. Moreover, Ness twists out a resolution that is revelatory in its obviousness, beautiful in its execution, and fearless in its honesty. Kay's artwork keeps the pace, gnawing at the edges of the pages with thundercloud shadows and keeping the monster just barely, terribly seeable. Sidestepping any trace of emotional blackmail, Ness shines Dowd's glimmer into the deepest, most hidden darkness of doubt, and finds a path through.--Chipman, Ia. Copyright 2010 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In his introduction to this profoundly moving, expertly crafted tale of unaccountable loss, Ness explains how he developed the story from a set of notes left by Siobhan Dowd, who died in 2007 before she had completed a first draft. "I felt-and feel-as if I've been handed a baton, like a particularly fine writer has given me her story and said, 'Go. Run with it. Make trouble.' " What Ness has produced is a singular masterpiece, exceptionally well-served by Kay's atmospheric and ominous illustrations. Conor O'Malley is 13. His mother is being treated for cancer; his father, Liam, has remarried and lives in America; and Conor is left in the care of a grandmother who cares more for her antique wall clock than her grandson. This grim existence is compounded by bullies at school who make fun of his mother's baldness, and an actual nightmare that wakes Conor, screaming, on a recurring basis. Then comes the monster-part human, part arboreal-a hulking yew tree that walks to his window just after midnight and tells three inscrutable parables, each of which disappoints Conor because the good guy is continually wronged. "Many things that are true feel like a cheat," the monster explains. In return for the monster's stories, Conor must tell his own, and the monster demands it be true, forcing Conor, a good boy, a dutiful son, to face up to his feelings: rage and, worse still, fear. If one point of writing is to leave something that transcends human existence, Ness has pulled a fast one on the Grim Reaper, finishing the story death kept Dowd from giving us. It is a story that not only does honor to her memory, it tackles the toughest of subjects by refusing to flinch, meeting the ugly truth about life head-on with compassion, bravery, and insight. Ages 12-up. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 7 Up-Patrick Ness takes a tale inspired by the late Siobhan Dowd and turns it into a deeply moving and magical novel (Candlewick, 2011). Is 13-year-old Conor O'Malley imagining that the yew tree is thundering down the hill to tell him scary stories? Or are the pressures of his mother's cancer and bullying classmates distorting his perceptions? Despite his mother's rapid decline, Conor doesn't expect help from his divorced father now living in America or want his stern grandmother's assistance. The gruff, living nightmare appears when the clock says 12:07, usually in the dark of night, but once at school lunch. Sometimes destructive acts happen during these visits, but other times Conor encounters terrifying images of his mother slipping over a cliff. The boy keeps trying to sort through his fears, denial, and loneliness. When his mother starts on a last ditch treatment using medicine from yew trees, Conor wants to believe she will recover. The ultimately supportive monster helps Conor face the truth as the teen painfully lets go. Narrator Jason Isaacs expertly runs the emotional gamut from the powerful and vociferous yew tree monster to the tender weakness of Connor's dying mother. He solidly captures the mood swings of the angry, frightened young man. At the conclusion of the tale, an interview with Ness explores the novel's development. The bonus CD contains Jim Kay's pen-and-ink arwork that reflects the mood of the tale. This fine audiobook offers unvarnished truth wrapped in fluid prose and cushioned with fantasy. A highly recommended addition to public, middle, and high school libraries.-Barbara Wysocki, Cora J. Belden Library, Rocky Hill, CT (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
Author Ness weaves a haunting tale of pain and redemption as narrator Isaacs imbues each strand with realism and magic, transporting listeners into the consciousness of Conor O'Malley, as the thirteen-year-old-boy faces the death of his mother from cancer. Isaacs removes all perception of actor or author, becoming the pure voice of storytelling, shifting from honest characterizations of Conor, his teenage peers, and the emotionally conflicted adults in his life to the sonorous mysticism of the Monster, whose midnight visits compel Conor to confront the truth of his emotions. This audiobook edition contains an interview with the author plus a bonus disc with illustrations from the book and accompanying audio excerpts. An essential title for every audio collection. mary burkey (c) Copyright 2012. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
From a premise left by author Siobhan Dowd before her untimely death, Ness has crafted a nuanced tale that draws on elements of classic horror stories to delve into the terrifying terrain of loss.When a monster in the form of an ancient yew tree crashes through his bedroom walls after midnight, calling his name, Conor is remarkably unperturbed"Shout all you want," he says. "I've seen worse." Indeed he has, in a recurring nightmare of someone slipping from his grasp, a nightmare whose horror he keeps to himself. Daily life is intolerable, as everyone from teachers to bullies treats him as though he were invisible since his mother began chemotherapy. The monster tells Conor three stories before insisting that Conor tell one himself. Asserting that "stories are the wildest things of all," the monster opens the door for Conor to face the guilty truth behind his subconscious fears. Ness brilliantly captures Conor's horrifying emotional ride as his mother's inevitable death approaches. In an ideal pairing of text and illustration, the novel is liberally laced with Kay's evocatively textured pen-and-ink artwork, which surrounds the text, softly caressing it in quiet moments and in others rushing toward the viewer with a nightmarish intensity.A poignant tribute to the life and talent of Siobhan Dowd and an astonishing exploration of fear.(Fiction. 11-14)]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
