Patrick Ness
Patrick Ness is a British-American novelist, journalist and screenwriter who specialises in YA fiction. A twice Carnegie Medal winner, he is one of the most acclaimed young adult writers to date and is best known for his Chaos Walking trilogy which has sold over a million copies worldwide. All of the books by Patrick Ness are founded on strikingly original ideas, which he carefully enriches with tender humour, deeply human characters and descriptive masterpieces.
Ness explores a vast range of subject matter: from the messy mundane lives of adolescents in The Rest of Us Just Live Here and Release with only hints of the supernatural, to the fast-paced sci-fi thrillers which make up Chaos Walking set on a distant planet far in the future. In all of his books, Patrick Ness employs aching emotional intensity, most clearly demonstrated in A Monster Calls which explores the devastation from watching a loved one die, and More than This, a haunting psychological thriller about dealing with the guilt of childhood mistakes.
Ness has also worked with esteemed illustrators such as Rovina Cai (And the Ocean Was Our Sky) and Jim Kay (A Monster Calls). A Monster Calls became the first book to be awarded both the Carnegie Medal and the Greenaway Medal for illustrations.
Books by Patrick Ness
A Monster Calls
by Patrick Ness
A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness, now a multiple award winning film featuring Sigourney Weaver and Felicity Jones, is about a young boy who faces hard truths as his mother undergoes chemotherapy. Challenged by school bullies and the threat of his cold and overbearing grandmother disturbing the careful equilibrium of his home life, Connor is visited at night by a monster conjured from the old yew tree in their garden. Each visit, this monster narrates a mystical story which guides Conner to the acceptance of terrifying realities. With breathtaking illustrations by Jim Kay, A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness is a hugely emotional and riveting read.
Release
by Patrick Ness
Release by Patrick Ness explores a fascinating counterpoint between the stories of a gay preacher's son, struggling under the crushing weight of his parent's expectations and their lack of acceptance of his sexuality, and the walking ghost of a girl murdered by her reckless boyfriend. Ness raises pressing issues about the nature of love on a familial and romantic level, and handles the heaviness of his subject matter with sensitivity and humour.
The Rest of Us Just Live Here
by Patrick Ness
The Rest of Us Just Live Here by Patrick Ness is a hilarious and compelling novel about finding the preternatural in the everyday. He follows the unglamorous and complicated lives of a group of high school seniors as they fumble through romantic relationships and tender friendships with the knowledge that the wider world is fast approaching. Ness takes the typical fantasy adventure with heroic teenagers and mythical adversaries and places it firmly in the backdrop, while he points out the intrigue in the mundane with wit and humour.
More Than This
by Patrick Ness
More Than This by Patrick Ness unites the genres of science fiction and psychological thriller as the reader is periodically fed important truths and explanations in the form of the return of the main character's memory in flashbacks. Set in a haunting alternative reality, the protagonist, Seth, wakes up after supposedly drowning in an eerie representation of his childhood town. The streets are deserted, and the only clue to the whereabouts of the population are coffin-like capsules from which Seth himself emerged. As realities of his former life are steadily revealed, we are fed one devastating truth after another, and are slowly able to piece together the complete picture of Seth's situation.
The Knife of Never Letting Go
by Patrick Ness
The first novel in the highly acclaimed Chaos Walking trilogy, The Knife of Never Letting Go is the story of a young boy, Todd Hewitt, living in a small town on a distant planet far in the future. In a world where the "noise" virus has killed all women and made every thought of the men and animals audible, Todd is forced to flee from his home as the destructive intentions of the Mayor of Prentisstown are revealed.
The Ask and the Answer
by Patrick Ness
The Ask and the Answer by Patrick Ness is the second of the Chaos Walking trilogy and continues Todd and Viola's epic adventure as they battle the oppression of Mayor Prentiss in his new town, Haven.
Interviews where books by Patrick Ness were recommended
The Best Young Adult Science Fiction Books, recommended by Estelle Francis
Young Adult science fiction extends far beyond the typical dystopian novels which immediately come to mind. Estelle Francis, a teenage author who recently published her first book, shares her favourite YA sci-fi reads.
