A Monster Calls

This was such a wonderful read. "A monster callls" quickly became one of my absolute favourite books. The eerie and dark illustrations support the story and convey a constant feeling of dread and is a mirror to Conor's emotions. His mother is terribly sick, bullies at school pick on him and his father lives in America. There is no joy in Conor's life. Someday, when everything gets too bad, a monster visits him to tell him stories. Even though this book made me cry several times I enjoyed every page of it. It's a modern classic and such an important read. You definitely should go for it!

I am still amazed by the first sentence of this book. It's perfect to immediately draw the reader into the story. The Monster Calls is about Conor who every night struggles with the same terrifying nightmare. One night though he awakes to a monster standing in front of his window. The monster shows up exactly seven minutes after midnight and wants to tell Conor three stories. Conor doesn’t seem to be afraid of the nocturnal visitor because he has a far bigger fear than a monster. I loved this book. It was beautiful to read in english, although it was an extremely sombre and sad story. The illustrations by Jim Kay made it so vivid and I could perfectly sympathize with Conor. I’m really looking forward to watching the movie adaptation of this book.

Conor O'Malley is a thirteen-year-old boy, who's been getting the same nightmare for months until a monster steps into his dreams, if they can be called that, and blurs the line between reality and dream for Conor. The summoned monster demands the truth of the young boy, who if suffering under the consequences of his mother's disease. Is the monster a helper or a burden? This work by Patrick Ness is actually a very easy and entertaining read. It is my first book that I read by this author and it is pretty obviously a children's book. However, I am now curious to read more of him as I hope that his writing will be less cheap-humour-based for the main character. What I liked about this book was not necessarily the writing style, but rather the topics that were tackled. How to decide what's good and bad? Is there even a real black or white decision to be made? How might you play the cards that you've been dealt? Yep, that are the good questions.