A Monster Calls

“What happened in the nightmare was something no one else ever needed to know.”

This quote establishes the deep sense of secrecy surrounding Conor’s nightmare. The reader does not get to learn the truth of the nightmare until the end of the novel, but it is a constant source of anxiety and shame for Conor. This sentiment, expressed in the first pages, highlights Conor’s secretive behavior and isolation, because it shows that he trusts no one with the truth of what happens in his nightmare.

“You’re a good boy. I wish you didn’t have to be quite so good.”

The morning after the monster’s first visit, Ness shows the various chores that Conor does unprompted each day. He makes his own breakfast, takes out the trash, loads the dishwasher, and starts a load of laundry. His mother is both appreciative and saddened by all of the responsibility her son has taken on since her diagnosis, and this quote shows her sorrow. She wants to be able to do more for Conor, and her comment here hints at more than just household chores. She wishes that Conor didn’t have to put on such a brave face when he is clearly suffering.

“His floor was covered in poisonous red yew tree berries. Which had somehow come in through a closed and locked window.”

Ness explores the duality of the yew tree and how it represents both life and death. In a medicinal sense, the yew tree can cure many illnesses. However, in its pure, raw form, the yew tree is highly toxic, and its berries are particularly deadly. The monster leaves yew tree berries on the floor of Conor’s bedroom to indicate that it is, in fact, real, but also to warn Conor that it is a dangerous force. The monster can help, but it can also bring death and destruction.

“I’m here because thirteen-year-old boys shouldn’t be wiping down counters without being asked to first.”

When Grandma arrives, she starts to take over the house: instead of Conor making dinner, she orders takeout. And when she sees Conor cleaning the countertops, she explains that he is taking on too much responsibility. Conor is still a child, and just like his mother, Grandma knows that Conor is trying to hide how much he is struggling with his mother’s illness. He claims that he has everything under control and he doesn’t need anyone’s help, but the adults in his life know that too much is being asked of him, and they are putting together a plan to help him, whether he likes it or not.

“Stories are wild creatures…When you set them loose, who knows what havoc they might wreak?”

Throughout the novel, Ness uses stories to teach valuable lessons. Stories can be full of powerful symbols, metaphors, themes, and lessons to help people make sense of the world around them. However, the monster warns that stories can also run wild and set loose dangerous thoughts, emotions, and ideas. Indeed, the stories that the monster tells Conor challenge his long-held beliefs and invoke a deep sense of rage that Conor wasn’t prepared for.

“Many things that are true feel like a cheat. Kingdoms get the princes they deserve, farmers’ daughters die for no reason, and sometimes witches merit saving.”

The monster’s stories share a common theme: there is not always a happy ending to stories. Fairytales may lead children to believe that good things happen to good people, and bad things happen to bad people. The first tale especially demonstrates that people cannot be placed in discrete categories, and the monster says that people are often somewhere in between good and bad. Moreover, the first tale shows Conor that someone like his grandmother—whom he views as wicked or unwanted—might just be doing her best to make the right choices.

“It was like a circle had opened around him, a dead area with Conor at the center, surrounded by land mines that everyone was afraid to walk through.”

Ness uses this figurative language to demonstrate the isolation that Conor experienced after news spread about his mother’s illness. No one wanted to talk to him or be close to him, and his entire life changed at school as well as at home. This is when people start to treat Conor as if he is invisible, because the reality of his mother’s diagnosis is too sad and too difficult for anyone around him to know how to talk to him about it.

“He knew right then he could probably stay out there all day and no one would punish him for it. Which somehow made him feel even worse.”

Along with Conor’s isolation at school, he also feels like he is being given special treatment when he doesn’t deserve it. School administrators issue him no punishments or reprimands, his teachers don’t call on him to answer questions in class or try to collect his homework, and he feels further isolated by these seemingly good intentions. Conor wants some sense of normalcy, and longs to be treated like any other student, because it might help to distract him from what is going on in his home life.

“Belief is half of all healing. Belief in the cure, belief in the future that awaits.”

Conor believes that if he refuses to accept his mother’s death, he might somehow be able to stop it from happening. The monster explains the importance of belief in the second tale, and later in the novel, Conor’s mother tells him that she thinks believing she could be cured helped her to stay alive longer. This idea that belief is powerful is what fuels Conor to hang on to belief, and in his nightmare, he blames himself for losing faith in the possibility of his mother being cured. In the same vein, if Conor believes that he can survive without his mother, he can start placing hope in the future beyond his mother’s illness.

“He was yelling […] so loud he couldn’t hear himself think, disappearing into the frenzy of destruction, just mindlessly smashing and smashing and smashing. The monster was right. It was very satisfying.”

When the monster invites Conor to help it destroy the Parson’s home, Conor hesitates, but joins in with very little persuasion. He quickly begins to lose himself in the act of destruction, and Ness uses this moment to demonstrate how easy it is for a person to lose their sense of identity when they are overwhelmed with anger. Conor doesn’t feel like himself at this moment, but he surrenders himself to rage. Although this is a stress-relieving, cathartic experience, his relief is short-lived.

“Destruction is very satisfying.”

When Conor becomes aware that he hasn’t destroyed the Parson’s home, but his grandmother’s living room, his relief is immediately replaced by horror, fear, and shame. He regrets letting loose and allowing the monster to convince him that it was okay to destroy. He hears the monster’s voice on the wind, reminding him that destruction is satisfying, but realizes that it is only satisfying for a moment. Now he is staring down the consequences of his actions, and this moment serves as a reminder that the consequences of what is said or done in anger continue long after the anger fades.

“Good-bye, O’Malley [...] I no longer see you.”

Although Conor has been using Harry’s harassment as a means to punish himself and to feel less invisible, Harry catches on and decides that the worst thing he can do to Conor—far more than hitting him or teasing him about his mother—is to pretend that he no longer sees Conor. He shakes Conor’s hand, formally ending his “understanding” with Conor, and withdraws the normalcy and attention that he was giving him. This moment, which could be a relief to Conor, since it means that the bullying will stop, actually causes him to lash out and attack Harry as it directly intensifies Conor’s insecurities and feelings of powerlessness.

“Then the monster leapt forward to make Harry see.”

The cafeteria scene is told in two different ways: what Conor experiences, and what the kids in the cafeteria see. Conor claims that the monster is the one who punches, jumps, and slams Harry’s head into things. However, the other students report that Conor was the one committing the acts of violence. This moment gives the first hint that the monster might just be in Conor’s head, and he might be having some kind of psychological breakdown.

“I explained what’s been going on, though. That he had been regularly bullying you and that your circumstances were…special.”

Miss Kwan, who has seen Harry harass Conor, tries to defend Conor in the headmistress’s office. In the process of trying to explain why legal action shouldn’t be taken against Conor, Miss Kwan refers again to Conor’s “special” circumstances at home. These circumstances might get him out of any possible legal trouble, but this comment also reminds Conor yet again that he is different, and his fight won’t be treated like any other normal fight between two boys.

“Conor was no longer invisible. They all saw him now. But he was further away than ever.”

Conor attacks Harry in order to not be “invisible” anymore. He is tired of people ignoring him or treating him like he isn’t a normal student. Although he gives in to the rage that drives him to attack Harry, and the monster assures him that he won’t be invisible anymore, Conor now has to deal with the aftermath of the attack. He is now seen by everyone at school, but instead of pitying him, they now fear him. He is further away from human connection than ever, and he realizes that he would rather connect with people than just be “seen.”

“I did not come to heal her [...] I came to heal you.”

When Conor confronts the monster and demands to know why it didn’t heal his mother, the monster reveals its own truth: it has come to help Conor heal through the process of grieving his mother, and to prepare him for her death. The yew tree is a tree of healing, but it cannot cure everything. It did not help Conor’s mother, which means that there is nothing else that can be done for her, and Conor must now accept what is going to happen. Throughout the novel, Conor has been struggling with his mental health in the wake of his grief, and although there is little that can be done to help his mother, Conor is not beyond saving.

“Even now he couldn’t say it. Even though they’d had the talk. Even though he’d known it all along. Because of course he had, of course he did, no matter how much he’d wanted to believe it wasn’t true, of course he knew. But still he couldn’t say it.”

This reveals what the reader has likely suspected all along: Conor doesn't really believe that his mother is going to get better. In fact, he has known for a long time that he was in denial about her imminent death. Still, even after talking to his mother in the hospital, Conor clings to some slight sliver of hope instead of facing the reality of what is going to happen to his mother. This quote shows how difficult false hope can be to let go of, even when the reality is clear.

“You let her go [...] You could have held on for longer [...] but you let her fall. You loosened your grip and let the nightmare take her.”

The monster is the one who reveals the truth of what happens in the dream; Ness never explicitly says during the narration of the nightmare that Conor let go of his mother. The source of Conor’s shame is finally revealed: when his mother needed him most in the nightmare, he let her go. Every time the nightmare comes, Conor hopes it will end differently, but each time, he is too tired, his mother is too heavy, and he cannot hang on any longer, so he allows the monster to take her so the horrible scene will end.

“He welcomed it with relief, because it was, at last, the punishment he deserved.”

Conor has internalized the truth of the nightmare for so long that he has come to believe that he deserves to be punished for what he does in the dream. Conor has convinced himself that because he let go of his mother, it must mean that he doesn’t love her and doesn’t want to place any more faith in healing that will never come. When he finally speaks the truth, he feels only brief relief, followed by imminent dread that he will surely be punished for the thoughts in his head.

“And he spoke the words. He spoke the truth. He told the rest of the fourth tale.”

When Conor’s nightmare is over, the monster insists that the tale is not told yet. The nightmare may have revealed that Conor let go of his mother, but the truth—the rest of the tale—is the “why.” Why did Conor let go of his mother when she needed his help? And here, Conor is forced to confess what he has been wrestling with all along: he is exhausted from the burden of false hope.

“I couldn’t stand the waiting anymore. I couldn’t stand how alone it made me feel.”

Conor admits to how he has been feeling throughout the novel and the time before, when his mother was first diagnosed. He has tried so hard to keep up a brave face, but in the process, he feels like he can’t be honest with himself or anyone else about how much he has been struggling. Conor has isolated himself from other people, and he hates having to go through the grieving process alone. He feels like he can’t be honest with his mother, his father, his grandmother, or anyone else, and he just wants it to all be over.

“And a part of you wished it would just end [...] even if it meant losing her.”

The monster reveals the other aspect of Conor “letting go” of his mother in the nightmare. He is exhausted from having to be alone and carry on the charade that everything would be okay, but he is also tired of watching his mother suffer. For the past year, his mother has struggled not only to fight her illness, but also to keep his spirits up and give him hope. Conor’s life has been covered in a cloud of dishonesty, and he wants it all to end and for his mother’s pain to end as well, even if it means acknowledging that she won’t get better.

“What you think is not important. It is only important what you do.”

The monster assures Conor that what has been happening in the nightmare is merely a thought, and the monster explains that a thought does not define him as a person. His actions are more important: Conor’s decision to be there for his mother and offer her love and support in her final moments is what matters. Conor may feel like a bad person because of what happens in his head, but as long as he is there with his mother to love her through the process, he isn’t a bad person. The way to absolve himself of his misplaced guilt isn’t through punishment, but through change.

“His mum was her daughter. And she was the most important person either of them knew. That was a lot to have in common. It was certainly a place to start.”

Although Conor spends most of the novel viewing his grandma as an obstacle or a villain, he starts to see her in a different light after he destroys her living room. By the final chapters, Conor has come to understand that even though they don’t get along, Grandma isn’t a bad person. In fact, she is the only other person who loves Conor’s mother as much as he does, which means that they have something to draw them close together. This commonality gives Conor hope that perhaps he and Grandma will be okay together after all.