A world where everyone’s thoughts can be heard by everyone else can be a monstrously desolate place and that`s the setting of the book The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness.
Todd is a 12-year-old boy on a new planet that humans have colonized. When humans get to the new world they find the native people that they call Spackle. Soon after meeting them they engage in a bloody war and the Spackle turn to letting loose a biological weapon, a virus called “the noise” that affects all men and animals on the planet by projecting their thoughts so anyone else can hear them.
The noise also killed all of the women, or so Todd has been told. Todd lives a calm life as a farm boy, tending sheep and wheat, and when he finds a real live girl in the swamps on the outskirts of his town, his whole world is turned upside down.
This book is well beyond great. It has everything a reader could want, from action and adventure to emotionally charged scenes. Ness also has a very good way of showing the difference between what people are saying and what they are thinking. The Noise is in a bold bigger print while the talking is in normal print and this really make the story easy to follow and understand.
The book is written from Todd’s first person perspective. The things Todd has to go through are things people can connect with. It is easy for the reader to feel emotionally close to Todd, almost like you are there with him, dealing with the same problems.
The plot is a twist filled rollercoaster ride with one event after another that leaves the readers thinking how or why that happened. The character development is great to with you just meeting Todd and thinking he’s an uneducated farm boy at the start to being this brave courageous man at the end. The setting really makes the book though being on a different planet with a virus that makes animal`s and men`s thoughts be projected for all to hear it makes it very interesting in dialogue scenes or when the characters are trying to hide things.
As an added bonus, the book is the first part of a three-part series, so there will be plenty more to enjoy.
