I read Patrick Ness’s A Monster Calls a year ago. I chose not to write about it because it was too personal, too magnificently beautiful to risk messing with the way it lingered. Now that the movie is out, I think I’m ready.
SPOILERS WILL ABOUND!!
As a young
boy struggles to navigate the reality of his mother’s cancer and the
increasingly futile treatments, a monster calls. This monster, an ancient tree
that comes to life, insists the boy called him. Now that he is there, he will
tell the boy three stories and the boy will tell him the fourth. These storytelling episodes are interspersed
with real world challenges: he is being bullied at school; his estranged father
is visiting again; his relationally distant grandmother is being forced to play
an increasing role in his life; his mother is steadily succumbing to the cancer
she is trying to hard to defeat.
The
monster’s stories are meant to prepare the boy for what is inevitable. When I first read the book, the stories confused me,
but as I watched the movie’s depiction some pieces fell into place. Here’s my
theory for what it's worth. The stories are about some of the greatest fears in
universal human experience: Life is unfair (the first story), hope and faith
can be lost (the second story); and we will never matter (the third story). [1]
