The Knife of Never Letting Go

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Nick Podehl, Patrick Ness: The Knife of Never Letting Go (2009, Walker Books Ltd)

E-book

English language

Published Sept. 5, 2009 by Walker Books Ltd.

ISBN:
978-1-4063-2700-7
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4 stars (41 reviews)

An unflinching novel about the impossible choices of growing up, by an award-winning writer.Imagine you're the only boy in a town of men. And you can hear everything they think. And they can hear everything you think. Imagine you don't fit in with their plans... Todd Hewitt is just one month away from the birthday that will make him a man. But his town has been keeping secrets from him. Secrets that are going to force him to run...

16 editions

Review of 'The Knife of Never Letting Go' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Great fast-paced chase, I also adored the fact that information about New World gets revealed gradually, mantaining curiosity in the reader. I also liked the presence of interesting themes (the possibility of reading other people's thoughts, regimes, war, etc.). BUT there's a big "but": I don't find Todd a believable character, not to mention the exagerated amount of unfortunate events he finds himself into, which sounded like an excuse to keep the reader hooked without mantaining credibility and coherence. Too many times Todd played dumb, too many times he was reluctant to take specific actions that anyone in his situations would have taken (I'm not specifing further in order to avoid spoilers). A character so unbelievable that shattered into pieces my suspension of disbelief.
However, to anyone reading this far in this review, keep in mind that the aforementioned flaws seems to be typical of the young adult genre, meaning …

Review of 'The Knife of Never Letting Go' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

Dystopia. Despair. Dread. A talking dog. Yes! A loveable, huggable, talkable dog. And death. Lots and lots of death. What more could you want from an end-of-the-world thriller? My only complaint would have to be the longevity of the main character. He is a whiny, annoying, brat that has the unfortunate fortune of surviving all of the unexpected curve balls that the end of times throws at him while his likeable sidekicks get killed off one by one. I'm excited to read the next book in the series... Despite the utter sense of hopelessness in the novel, I can't help but stay optimistic that the protagonist gets dead soon.

Review of 'The Knife of Never Letting Go' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

At first I had difficulties getting into this book because of how the narrator speaks and his pronunciation (or pronunseyahasun) of words. The predictable escalation of the story prior to the chapter break got a little tiresome and I didn't find myself enjoying the story that much. I came to the Chaos Walking series because of a review that mentioned it while discussing The Hunger Games and I thought I would receive the same level of enjoyment. While I enjoyed The Hunger Games series more, I am willing to give the rest of the Chaos Walking stories a chance, especially after the last 30% of the book improved and started to accelerate the story.

The concept of Noise, settling on a foreign world to start over and the mystery around Prentisstown kept me going and it was an easier story to get into when I was able to read …

Review of 'The Knife of Never Letting Go: Chaos Walking' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

While i did enjoy this book, I did take issues with some of it. For starters Manchee was really annoying and while dogs do act that way (apart from talking) i think the dog did throw the story off a little for me. Also censorship did get on my nerves, I don’t like it, never have never will; I know that it was bec ause it was a YA book and he didn’t want to expose the readers to that, but there is probably a better way to express frustrasion and anger without pretending to curse.

Apart from those issues, the book does a great job of progressing the story and held my interest all the way till the end. Its a great YA novel, but be warned cliffhanger at the end will make you want to read the next one pretty much straight away.

Review of 'The Knife of Never Letting Go' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

You know when everyone tells you a book is amazing and when you get round to reading it, it falls a bit flat in your expectations? That's how I feel about The Knife of Never Letting Go. I'm pretty sure I'd have enjoyed it more if I wasn't expecting it to become suddenly amazing after each passing chapter.

Not to say it isn't a good book. The idea of being able to hear everyone's thoughts provides an interesting narrative, the first person accounts are not necessarily Todd's. Todd is the last boy in Prentisstown and is about to become a man in a world without women. At the start of the book, it's made clear that what Todd thinks to be true isn't the actual truth. As an adult reader, I think I worked it all out far too quickly and just wanted to get to the end to have …

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