Our 11-year-old son read The Monster Who Wasn’t first. I started to read it, found it too confusing, and put it by our bed when he walked in the room. “So, you’re reading that?” he asked. I told him that I started to read it, but got lost a chapter or two into the book. He stated that it was a great book, full of monsters and action and that I’d really enjoy it. Our oldest son reads books like I’d eat bacon if there were an endless supply of it in the kitchen. When I finished The Monster Who Wasn’t I agreed with him for the part.
Upon my initial read into the book, I was intimidated by the two-page introduction. It sets up a world where fairies are born from a baby’s first laugh. There are also dozens of monsters including ogres, trolls, witches, and more who are born when a human lets out their last sigh. Sighs are created by anger, disappointment, death, and things along those lines. OK, don’t let our course overview of the book set you in the wrong direction. I would advise simply skipping the two-page introduction and jumping knee-high into The Monster Who Wasn’t.
As the book opens we see a human family in mourning and a group of monsters trying to figure out their newest arrival. It’s Hatchling Day and a new monster is nigh. This one looks different though. There are no pointy noses, fangs, giant ears, humpbacks, or other distinguishing marks. Instead, this new arrival arrives via its egg with legs and arms waving manically and looking all too frail. The imp, as the monsters call it, grows up amongst the Thunderguts, the main monster, and his minions as they plot conquest upon those who aren’t like them.
Author T. C. Shelley does a masterful job of creating the world that the monsters and fairies live in. It’s a world where readers can all but smell the putrid stench of the slime being dragged by the creature’s bare feet. The first couple of chapters does as good of a job as transporting readers to the dank, chaotic world of long-nosed beasts as anything you’ve read in Lord of the Rings or The BFG. That is high praise and The Monster Who Wasn’t will hook in readers who resonate with those books.
If anything, it was the large cast of characters that watered down our enjoyment of the book. At times I had to flip back a couple of pages just so I could refresh myself on whom certain characters were. This is a book that’s intended for readers aged 8-12, I tried to assure myself. It is, and avid readers in upper elementary through middle school who want a deeply engaging story that will put them in another world need to read this.
It won’t hook every reader because it demands your attention. To that extent, it’s much more akin to LOTR than The BFG. The chapter-length in The Monster Who Wasn’t varies, which is for older readers. If the chapters were just a bit shorter; then the book would be more approachable to middle elementary. As it stands, it’s a very good book in which I’ll readily read the second entry into the Monster Who Wasn’t trilogy, but I’ll pay more attention while reading.
The Monster Who Wasn’t is by T. C. Shelley and on Bloomsbury Kids.
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