The Knife of Never Letting Go (Chaos Walking #1)

The Scoop:

On New World, in the town of Prentisstown Todd Hewitt is the only boy in a town of men. But Prentisstown isn’t like other towns. Everyone can hear everyone else’s thoughts (including animals) in an overwhelming, constant stream of Noise. Just a month before the birthday that makes Todd a man, he and his faithful dog, Manchee, whose simple, loyal voice he also hears happen upon an area of complete silence. While Todd tries to keep thoughts of the silence out of his Noise he fails. He knows that the silence is part of an even larger secret the powerful men of Prentisstown are trying to hide from him and ends up on the run from them with only Manchee as his companion. Todd and Manchee return to the location where they first heard nothing and the two stumble upon the strange and eerily silent creature: a girl. Who is she? Why wasn't she killed by the germ like all the females on New World? They convince her they mean no harm and encourage her to join their escape. And, so, Todd, Manchee and Viola must try and escape from their pursuers who can hear their every thoughts.

My Thoughts:

Nick Podehl is my audiobook god! Ever since his first "dang it" in Carter Finally Gets It I have loved everything he has narrated. And this goes above and beyond all of my past experience. Narrating the animals and all the "Noise" made my experience so much better than if I had read it to myself. I'm sure that's part of the whole production but it added such a great element to a crazy, crazy story.

In other news, this book really should have been titled The Knife of Never STOP RUNNING. Seriously. These kids run for freakin' ever. They run for hours. That army from Prentisstown must be some big ol' evil because there is nothing that would make me run for that long. Holy geez, but those are some tough kids.

And, Manchee, the talking dog. Well, all the animals talk but he's awesome. Todd wasn't all that excited at having a dog throughout most of the story but Manchee definitely proved his worth tenfold by the time the story was over.

I also really liked how Todd grew as a person over the first book in the trilogy (haven't gotten to the other ones yet) from distrusting a girl--because he hadn't ever been around one and all the men in his town brainwashed him to thinking they were bad--to really depending on her and risking his own life to save hers. Just from his "Noise" and other thoughts he seemed like a real teenager (prone to "speaking" without first thinking, quick to judge and ready to take the easy way out) and I really like that he wasn't written like a know-it-all with all the knowledge he needed to survive what was happening to him. He was just this kid that was thrown out on his own and had to figure out, with the help of his faithful dog and, after a while, the help of his new-found friend, Viola.

And while I enjoyed the thrill-a-minute ride that this story was I couldn't help thinking more than once that couldn't Todd and Viola catch a break just one time? Those kids were constantly watching their backs, running from their pursuers and trying to survive by their limited wits and supplies. And the cliff-hanger ending ensured that they wouldn't get any respite in the next book of the series.

I picked up The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness thinking it was going to be a dystopian, but as far as I understand the definition of a dystopian, this is not one. Or it is, but only by the slimmest margin. I personally feel this book is firmly in the science fiction category. But that's only a problem with the labeling, not the book itself.

I'm not going to lie. This book wreaked havoc with my emotions. Partly because of the writing style. Partly because of the premise. Partly because it was just so different from any other book I've ever read. And partly because it made me feel like throwing things. And then the end...

Don't worry, I'm not going to spoil it. Just let me say, the urge to throw things was never quite so strong. Fortunately, I was in bed next to my sleeping husband, so I didn't throw it. Which is good, because it was a borrowed copy, and I had promised my friend I wouldn't so much as dogear a page, much less hurl the book against the wall.

So. Let's get down to it.

The first thing that hit me about this book was the writing style. It takes some getting used to. Todd is the narrator, and he is uneducated and mostly illiterate, so the narrative is full of improper grammar and syntax, misspellings, and run-on sentences galore. If that's going to bother you, this is not the book for you, because it doesn't improve a bit throughout the entire book. It's not like Todd goes to college while trekking through the swamp.

As for Todd, he also had to grow on me a bit. I had to keep in mind that he was a 13-year-old boy (although he is about to turn 13 in Prentisstown, he says that a New World year is 13 months, which means that in our time, Todd is nearly 14), and therefore he wasn't going to be the wisest or quickest or most sensitive character. He's fairly bull-headed and slow on the uptake in the beginning, plus his treatment of Manchee is horrid. But after they flee Prentisstown, Todd begins to mature and grow, and his relationship with Manchee actually became one of my favorite parts of the book.

Speaking of Manchee, he quickly became one of my favorite literary animal characters. Even with the limited vocabulary and intellect of a dog, Manchee was fiercely loyal and protective of Todd, and I found him incredible endearing.

Then we get to the villains. And there are a lot of villains. One in particular, Aaron, is so freakishly creepy that I'm surprised I didn't have nightmares about him. The only complaint I have (because really, a super-creepy villain is not a complaint for me) is that he's still supposed to be human, even though he's crazy and evil and lives on an alien world. And several of the things Aaron manages to pull off throughout the course of the book seem decidedly inhuman.

Maybe he was a Cylon. Maybe that's a twist in the next book. I don't know. I haven't read it yet.

As for the plot in this book, the action and suspense never lets up. Todd barely has a moment's peace from the moment he flees Prentisstown until the end of the book. The danger is constant and terrifying. And with each twist and turn of the plot, the situation just seems to become more dire and bleak. A constant theme running through the book is that hope is necessary for survival, but it seems that every time Todd scrapes together a sliver of hope, it is snatched away from him and replaced with heartbreak and horror.

It's kind of hard to deal with.

But. Todd was able to rally just enough each time for me to want to keep reading. And interspersed in this incredibly dark story were moments of innocent joy and humor that would pop up at completely unexpected times.

And then there was that ending. Ugh. Don't start this book if you need things resolved by the end. It doesn't happen.

So now I have many feelings about this book. I loved the story, loved Todd and Manchee, loved the incredibly unique world that Patrick Ness created. But it also made me feel so sad and frustrated and disappointed so many times -- not because the book was disappointing, but because Todd was disappointed. It's hard to mesh all those feelings together into a coherent opinion.

Overall, I would say that The Knife of Never Letting Go is a different type of Young Adult book; it's darker, it's scarier, and it's grittier than most of the YA sci-fi out there. It will not appeal to you if you're squeamish about violence or yearn for neat and happy endings. But it features wonderfully developed characters in a brilliant new world (no pun untended) that I'm excited to keep exploring -- even if it drives me crazy.