By Melissa Wilson
This week’s text is a young adult novel by Patrick Ness called The Knife of Never Letting Go. While searching for book reviews I saw that its genre is called “speculative fiction,” a term with which I am unfamiliar. What I discovered with more searching is that it is a literary category that comprises science fiction and fantasy, but it is a bit more “serious” or “highbrow.” Margaret Atwood describes her novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, as speculative fiction, which is interesting as when I was reading the Ness novel I kept making text-to-text connections with Atwood’s book.
The Knife of Never Letting Go is book one in a series that is, of course, about to be made into a Hollywood blockbuster. Knowing this, I started reading with some trepidation, but really the initial sentence put my fears to rest. “The first thing you learn when yer dog learns to talk is that dogs don’t got nothing much to say” (p.3). Todd, the protagonist, the last boy in his all male settlement in “the new world” is forced to run away from his home in Prentisstown with his talking dog. 
As the last “innocent” citizen, Todd is given the task of finding the truth. This “truth” involves a journey where he meets a girl, Viola, who becomes his traveling companion and together they go through horrific emotional and physical traumas. During that journey Todd and Viola form a tight friendship bond as Todd comes closer to knowing the truth that he had no idea was missing from his life.
In certain ways this novel could be seen as a criticism of our current world, all the men’s thoughts can be heard by everyone (women can hear, but their thoughts cannot be heard). This makes for a stressful environment where there is no such thing as silence. This could be seen as analogous to riding on a crowded subway car in NYC or London and hearing what seems like a hundred different conversations on mobile phones. It is also reminiscent of our “wired” age where to find a respite from useful and useless noise one must go hide in the woods.
But this text also speaks to the past, one that I interpreted as the story of the English settlers in America. A group of religious extremists leave their home to go to the “New World” to start again. And like our puritanical ancestors, punishment is swift and cruel for those who are seen as unbelievers. Todd is taught to obey and to never question the leaders and especially Aaron, the head of the church. And because men’s thoughts can be heard and women’s can’t, this difference scares the men and causes them to either annihilate women or to keep them penned up together.
I wonder if this novel will be challenged in America. Its subtext is anti-religious. Viola, who is from a spaceship, sees the New World folk as ignorant fools who “tried to turn back the clock to the dark ages” (p. 236). The most evil character is the preacher and the reader learns that though the settlements started with the best intentions, power and greed corrupted the Eden that wasn’t.
In the UK religion just isn’t a big thing. People are tolerant for the most part. There are no billboards by the side of the road threatening drivers that “Jesus is watching.” There are fewer churches and being an atheist is socially acceptable even for politicians. And I think the novels I have read by what they say and what they don’t say reflect this indifference to religion.
This text also seems to support the argument mentioned in last week’s blog that Americans may lack the ironic sense of humor needed to question reality. The Knife of Never Letting Go certainly gives the reader plenty of reason to question. Another thing I have noticed in both novels that I have discussed thus far is the intertextuality the authors employ. This week’s novel harkens to The Wizard of Oz as there are two misfits on their way to a promised place of hope that will solve all of their problems. There is also a running reference to the poem “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost. The protagonists come to a fork in the road and take the road that looks most taken and come to regret it a number of times.
I wonder if the tacit theories of youth in the UK give readers more credit for being able to make text-to-text connections? This is something I look forward to exploring next week.
Cheerio!
Journey through Worlds of Words during our open reading hours: Monday through Friday 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Saturday 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Check out our two online journals, WOW Review and WOW Stories, and keep up with WOW’s news and events.
- Themes: Knife of Never Letting Go, Melissa Wilson
- Descriptors: Books & Resources, WOW Currents