For those of you who are still twitter-free, or who were absent from their twitter for that ONE DAY in which I read The Knife of Never Letting Go, allow me to repeat myself. I loved this book so. hard. I wanted to take it behind the middle school and get it pregnant and/or put a ring on it..
And, I mean, there were so many things to hate about it. It's written in dialect! Subtle-like, but it's there IN THE FIRST PERSON, and if there's anything more irritating than reading dialect, I don't know it. But all the 'tho's and 'cuz's and 'izzent's actually added to the story and made it enveloping and real, instead of pissing me off or just being thrown in there like a garnish that no one eats, but that says Here, I made an effort.
.Also, the animals talk, and if that isn't just the stupidest thing I ever heard. But LIKE THE DIALECT, it is no gimmick. It is deeply entrenched and necessary, and more hilarious than not. I would not have silenced the animals for all the world.
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And then there's this one totally devastating moment that is SUCH a raging cliche if you say it out loud, very much the tragic equivalent of '...and then the princess married the prince the end,' but it damn well breaks your heart. If you do not shed hot, fat tears when this Thing happens, then we are quits, amigo.
.AND IT'S YA!! All you YA white knights are pelting me with I-told-you-so's, and you are so right. Because this is...I can't think of words. Un-stupid? Dis-obvious? Non-trying-too-hard?
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Why am I not summarizing plot for you? Because I am drunk on this book and having trouble arranging my thoughts into things that aren't cuss words.
.Ok, so Todd lives in a tiny settlement on some other planet, and something happened so that everyone can hear everyone else's thoughts all the time, and all the women are dead. Also, his dog talks. Also, he makes a discovery that sends him on a quest from which he can never return and which will guide him into becoming a man and see?!?! So cliche. But it is hella awesome and I'm not telling you anymore.
.Oh, except this: the ending = cliffhanger. Not a pansy-ass cliffhanger where the story wraps up nicely and then the last chapter throws in the obligatory wrench, but an honest-injun I-would-sell-a-kidney-to-find-out-what-happens-next-please-do-not-leave-us-here-in-this-abyss-where-we-cannot-find-you-Patrick-Ness cliffhanger. So, heads up.
.Now I must go and slather P Ness with bubble wrap so that he doesn't DIE before finishing the series.
.Also, nine and a half caterpillars. And that's lots.
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