LoveReading Says
Winner of the Costa Children's Book Award 2009.
Costa Book Awards 2009 Judges' comment: "A strikingly original and compelling work."
Shortlisted for the prestigious Teenage Book of the Year Award 2009.
Prize-winning author Patrick Ness follows up The Knife of Never Letting Go with equally hard hitting The Ask and the Answer.
Trying to escape, Todd and Viola fall into the hands of Mayor Prentiss.
Separated from Viola and imprisoned, Todd can tell there are some deep
and dark secrets outside the town. Who are the mysterious Answer? As
gripping as The Knife of Never Letting Go, this is a tough but compelling story which takes readers into shocking and moving territory.
Titles on this year’s Teenage Book of the Year Award shortlist include:
Auslander by Paul Dowswell
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
Ostrich Boys by Keith Gray
The Ant Colony by Jenny Valentine
The Vanishing of Katharina Linden by Helen Grant
The Ask and the Answer by Patrick Ness
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The Ask and the Answer Synopsis
"Grim and beautifully written. . . . Superb. . . . This is among the best YA science fiction novels of the year." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Reaching the end of their flight in The Knife of Never Letting Go, Todd and Viola did not find healing and hope in Haven. They found instead their worst enemy, Mayor Prentiss, waiting to welcome them to New Prentisstown. There they are forced into separate lives: Todd to prison, and Viola to a house of healing where her wounds are treated. Soon Viola is swept into the ruthless activities of the Answer, while Todd faces impossible choices when forced to join the mayor's oppressive new regime. In alternating narratives the two struggle to reconcile their own dubious actions with their deepest beliefs. Torn by confusion and compromise, suspicion and betrayal, can their trust in each other possibly survive? Includes a bonus short story.
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9780763676179 |
| Publication date: |
22nd July 2014 |
| Author: |
Patrick Ness |
| Publisher: |
Candlewick Press |
| Format: |
Paperback |
| Pagination: |
560 pages |
| Series: |
Chaos Walking |
| Primary Genre |
Young Adult Fiction
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| Other Genres: |
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| Recommendations: |
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About Patrick Ness
Patrick Ness was born on an army base called Fort Belvoir, near Alexandria, Virginia, in the United States. His father was a drill sergeant in the US Army. He lived in Hawaii until he was almost six, spent the ten years after that in suburban Washington state, and then on to Los Angeles, where he studied English Literature at the University of Southern California.
His main job after graduating was as corporate writer at a cable company, writing manuals, form letters and speeches and once even an advertisement for the Gilroy, California Garlic Festival (this is true). If you're American and hated your cable company, he probably wrote you a letter of apology.
He got his first story published in Genre magazine in 1997 and was working on his first novel when he moved to London in 1999. He's lived here ever since. Sometimes he teaches creative writing but mostly he tries to write 1,000 words a day, 'come hell or high water'.
In May 2008, he published The Knife of Never Letting Go, his first book for young adults. It won the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize and the Booktrust Teenage Prize and he hasn't looked back since. Click here to read a Q&A with Patrick.
10 Things You Didn't Know About Patrick Ness
1. He has a tattoo of a rhinoceros.
2. He has run two marathons.
3. He is a certified scuba diver.
4. He wrote a radio comedy about vampires.
5. He has never been to New York City but...
6. He has been to Sydney, Auckland and Tokyo.
7. He got accepted into film school but turned it down to study writing.
8. He was a goth as a teenager (well, as much of a goth as you could be in Tacoma, Washington and still have to go to church every Sunday).
9. He is no longer a goth.
10. Under no circumstances will he eat onions.
Author photo © Helen Giles
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