Patrick Ness: SEDEM MINUT ČEZ POLNOČ ( A Monster Calls)

Some books are a true art, and not just because of the story which is so magnificently told, but also because of how the book looks. The whole package is something to admire and I think this is the case with the book Sedem minut čez polnoč (A Monster Calls is the original title). 

An unflinching, darkly funny, and deeply moving story of a boy, his seriously ill mother, and an unexpected monstrous visitor. 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.

The author is Patrick Ness, but the story was inspired by Siobhan Dowd, whose premature death from cancer prevented her from writing it herself. Illustrator of the book was Jim Kay. The book won several awards, Ness and Kay won the Carnegie and Greenaway Medals for writing and illustration, recognising the year's best work published in the UK. The double win alone is unprecedented in more than fifty years since the illustration award was established.

I would recommend this book to everyone, really. It's such a powerful, strong novel. And the last paragraph is so heartbreaking jet so beautiful. 

Quotes from the book:

“You do not write your life with words...You write it with actions. What you think is not important. It is only important what you do.” 


“There is not always a good guy. Nor is there always a bad one. Most people are somewhere in between.” 


“Stories don't always have happy endings."
This stopped him. Because they didn't, did they? That's one thing the monster had definitely taught him. Stories were wild, wild animals and went off in directions you couldn't expect.” 


“And if one day,' she said, really crying now, 'you look back and you feel bad for being so angry, if you feel bad for being so angry at me that you couldn't even speak to me, then you have to know, Conor, you have to that is was okay. It was okay. That I knew. I know, okay? I know everything you need to tell me without you having to say it out loud.” 

And now I'm crying again.

Have a great day!

Patrick Ness: More Than This

My first book of Patrick Ness, and certainly not the last. What to say, I liked it. I didn't know what to expect and I was really pleasantly surprised. The book classifies as a young adult novel and this could put off some of the readers. I, on the other hand, read quite a lot YA novels, also because I have a younger sister, who buys books like crazy, mostly from the YA sector. When I started working in the bookshop, this one had a sign NEW, so I picked it up and read the description. And so it went on my reading list. Here is the description.

A boy called Seth drowns, desperate and alone in his final moments, losing his life as the pounding sea claims him. But then he wakes. He is naked, thirsty, starving. But alive. How is that possible? He remembers dying, his bones breaking, his skull dashed upon the rocks. So how is he is here? And where is this place?

Sometimes can be the YA novels more profound, meaningful, touching than books for adult readers and I don't want to miss some good books just because of their label. Would I reccomend this book to someone? I already did :)

"What I do know is that you give a human being a chance to be stupid and violent, then they're going to take it, every time. No matter where they are."

'"I don't belive in guardian angels," Regine says seriously. "Just people who are there for you and people who aren't." "Yes," Tomasz says. "Yes, I agree with this." "Just people," Seth says, finding he agrees, too.'

'No, life didn't always go how you tought it might. Sometimes it didn't make any sense at all. You 've just got to find a way to live there anyway, Seth thinks.'

(bookdepository.com)