The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness, guest post by Susan Cassidy

 

At a few months shy of the birthday that will mark his passage to manhood, Todd Hewitt, the youngest resident of Prentisstown, New World, has never seen anyone younger than himself, and has never seen a girl or a woman. Bizarre as this is, it is not the most unusual fact of his existence. On New World, everyone can hear the thoughts of men and animals. This cacophony is called Noise, and there is no relief from it unless you are by yourself.

Todd is often by himself. All the other boys who used to be his companions are now men, and Prentisstown men don't associate with boys. Todd lives with his foster fathers, Ben and Cillian, who took him in when his mother, the last woman in the settlement, died. Like the rest of the New World settlers, they are subsistence farmers, and there is always work to be done.

As he labors on the farm or runs errands for his fathers, Todd's constant companion is Manchee, the dog Cillian bought for him on his last birthday. The book memorably opens with Todd's opinion of his dog:

"The first thing you find out when yer dog learns to talk is that dogs don't got nothing much to say. About anything.

            'Need a poo, Todd.'

            'Shut up, Manchee.'

            'Poo. Poo, Todd.'

            'I said shut it.' "

Manchee is the best dog in literature. I'll admit that my opinion may be skewed by the fact that I tend to avoid dog stories because the dogs almost always die, but I'm still sticking with my claim.

It's difficult to write about this book—the opening novel in the Chaos Walking trilogy—without giving away secrets. Todd knows so little; young, illiterate and protected by his fathers, he is not aware of the history of how New World was settled, what happened to the native population, what caused all the women to die, and most of all, what awaits him on becoming a man. In this first person novel, the reader discovers the truth when Todd does.

The secrets begin to peel away in the first chapter, when Todd and Manchee are out in the swamp, gathering apples, and they discover a hole in the Noise. Todd says, "There ain't nothing but Noise in this world, nothing but the constant thoughts of men and things coming at you and at you and at you," but this is different.

"It's weird, it is, out there, hiding somewhere, in the trees or somewhere outta sight, a spot where yer ears and yer mind are telling you there's no Noise…It's not like the quiet of the swamp, which is never quiet obviously, just less Noisy. But this, this is a shape, a shape of nothing, a hole where all Noise stops."

The hole in the Noise is Viola Eade, a girl. On a scouting mission with her parents, their craft has crashed and she is the sole survivor, marooned on New World with no way to contact the ship of settlers that will land on the planet in a few months. Her fate and Todd's become linked as his discovery of her in the swamp sets off a chain of events that continues through three books.

The Knife of Never Letting Go tells of the journey that Todd and the Noise-less Viola take to find a place of safety. They discover that Prentisstown is not the only settlement on New World, and that Viola is not the only girl, but I won't provide any more plot details because the unrelenting suspense is an important part of these books. And if you hate cliffhanger endings, you'd better have all three books on hand before you begin the first one.

A word about Ness' style: I had heard of this book many times before I finally started to read it, and I put it down after the first (short) chapter. Todd's voice, which I now find completely endearing, grated on me with its long, stream of consciousness sentences and ungrammatical usage. Hopefully that's not a problem you have, but if it is, I advise you to press on. I didn't pick up the book again until I started hearing so much about the final book, which was published last fall.  Of course, Ness reveals his characters through their voices, and Todd is unforgettable. In the second book, The Ask and the Answer, Viola's character becomes fully realized as she shares the narration with Todd. And the third book, Monsters of Men, adds a surprise third narrator.

Much of The Knife of Never Letting Go deals with the discovery of the truth and the question of what it means to be a man. Todd, who has been waiting all his life to be accepted into the society of men, comes to learn that he must define manhood in his own way. As a boy who was raised with no knowledge of women, he is in a unique position to know Viola without being crippled by the prejudices of his society.

But in discussing themes, it is impossible to separate this book from its sequels, in which it becomes clear that Ness is taking on a host of big themes: not only truth and adulthood, but power, loyalty, love, morality, racism, madness, and war. The Ask and the Answer and Monsters of Men are considerably grimmer than the first book, as Ness explores the darker sides of these themes with difficult scenes of murder, torture and genocide. Yet none of it is gratuitous; rather, by putting the characters in nearly impossible situations, deeper questions about what it means to be human are posed.

Despite the lengthy treatment (1600 pages in all) of these weighty themes, the books are quick reads. The compelling voices of the characters will pull you in, the conflict—and Ness' willingness to kill off nearly anyone—will keep you reading, and the ending that draws out the suspense until the final line will satisfy you deeply.