A Monster Calls was published on 5 May 2011 by the one and only Walker Books. If you follow my blog at all, you'll probably know that I have only recently been introduced to Ness's work and that I have now declared my undying love for his ability to make the written word into something so extraordinary. SO, when i got asked to be a part of the blog tour for his latest release, A Monster Calls, well let's just say I broke out the happy dance.
It is my absolute pleasure to present to you lovely people, the fifth extract from A Monster Calls:-
School
He could already taste the blood in his mouth as he got up. He had bitten the inside of his lip when he hit the ground, and it was what he focussed on now as he stood, the strange metallic flavour that made you want to spit it out immediately, like you’d eaten something that wasn’t food at all.
He swallowed it instead. Harry and his cronies would have been thrilled beyond words if they knew Conor was bleeding. He could hear Anton and Sully laughing behind him, knew exactly the look on Harry’s face, even though he couldn’t see it. He could probably even guess what Harry would say next in that calm, amused voice of his that seemed to mimic every adult you never wanted to meet.
“Be careful of the steps there,” Harry said. “You might fall.”
Yep, that’d be about right.
It hadn’t always been like this.
Harry was the Blond Wonder Child, the teachers’ pet through every year of school. The first pupil with his hand in the air, the fastest player on the football pitch, but for all that, just another kid in Conor’s class. They hadn’t been friends exactly – Harry didn’t really have friends, only followers; Anton and Sully basically just stood behind him and laughed at everything he did – but they hadn’t been enemies, either. Conor would have been mildly surprised if Harry had even known his name.
Somewhere over the past year, though, something had changed. Harry had started noticing Conor, catching his eye, looking at him with a detached amusement.
This change hadn’t come when everything started with Conor’s mum. No, it had come later, when Conor started having the nightmare, the real nightmare, not the stupid tree, the nightmare with the screaming and the falling, the nightmare he would never tell another living soul about. When Conor started having that nightmare, that’s when Harry noticed him, like a secret mark had been placed on him that only Harry could see.
A mark that drew Harry to him like iron to a magnet.
On the first day of the new school year, Harry had tripped Conor coming into the school grounds, sending him tumbling to the pavement.
And so it had begun.
And so it had continued.
YAY!! Sounds amazing right? YEAH? so go buy it!!
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