Praise for The Rest of Us Just Live Here: “Fresh, funny, and full of heart: not to be missed.” - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
Praise for The Rest of Us Just Live Here: “Ness’ deadpan sci-fi novel pokes fun at far-fetched futuristic fantasies while emphasizing the important victories of merely living. This memorable, moving, and often hilarious read is sure to be a hit.” - Booklist (starred review)
“Patrick Ness is an insanely beautiful writer.” - John Green
Praise for The Rest of Us Just Live Here: “Fans of madcap humor and satire and those seeking more thought-provoking alternatives to the usual fare will appreciate this unique and clever take on a familiar trope.” - School Library Journal (starred review)
Praise for The Rest of Us Just Live Here: “Clever and laugh-out-loud funny, the supernatural side notes add tension and humor to the story. This is highly recommended for libraries serving young adults.” - Voice of Youth Advocates (VOYA) (starred review)
“Every sentence in this gorgeous little novel feels perfect and necessary. This focused, humane book is a joy.” - The New York Times Book Review
★ “Literary, illuminating, and stunningly told.” - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
★ “A frank, riveting portrayal of a gay teenager’s sexual awakening.” - Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“A heartbreaking dual narrative follows Adam, a gay teenager with homophobic parents, and the ghost of a classmate murdered by her meth-addicted boyfriend, over the course of one, defining day. In the hours before a going-away party for his first love, Adam Thorn has fateful confrontations with his evangelical pastor father and with the creepy boss who has been sexually harassing him. But the real bombshell is dropped when Angela, a friend Adam relies on, announces that she’s moving from Washington State to the Netherlands for senior year. Ness (The Rest of Us Just Live Here) interleaves Adam’s multipronged crisis with a strand tracking the murdered girl’s spirit as it seeks revenge (in the company of a seven-foot-tall faun) against her killer. Adam’s story dominates the narrative and provides a frank, riveting portrayal of a gay teenager’s sexual awakening (an endnote acknowledges the influence of both Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway and Blume’s Forever). The paranormal storyline isn’t quite as affecting as the plotline that follows Adam, but it conveys a sense of the mystery that can infuse ordinary lives.” - Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“This book’s self-awareness lends its events a dreamlike feel. Though it functions as an accessible, standalone coming-of-age story, awareness of its influences makes for a layered reading experience.” - The Horn Book
“Told in alternating chapters narrated by both main characters, this novel (heavily influenced by Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway and Judy Blume’s Forever) is meant for sophisticated readers who will appreciate its various textual subtleties, minute attention to detail, and sophisticated sexual symbols and scenes which are explicit yet celebratory, serving to provide important contrasts between unhealthy and loving relationships. Adam is immensely likeable and his story is hilarious, gripping, and viciously insightful throughout... [T]he novel’s main points are continuously, beautifully conveyed: family consists of people chosen as much as those related by blood; and while all meaningful and positive relationships are difficult and messy, their maintenance is essential for fulfillment.” - Voice of Youth Advocates (VOYA)
“Hilarious, gripping, and viciously insightful throughout. The novel’s main points are continuously, beautifully conveyed: family consists of people chosen as much as those related by blood; and while all meaningful and positive relationships are difficult and messy, their maintenance is essential for fulfillment.” - Voice of Youth Advocates (VOYA)
“ ‘Virginia Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway meets Judy Blume’s Forever’ is as good a pitch as I’ve heard this year, and this beautifully crafted, complex novel, which Ness calls his most personal yet, does not disappoint. Seventeen-year-old Adam Thorn must keep his sexuality and his boyfriend secret from his very religious family. The story takes place on a single day, which is turning out to be the most unsettling of his life, packed with love, heartbreak, and confrontation. Told with real tenderness, it’s a brilliant portrayal of the intensity of a teenager’s inner life.” - Bookseller (UK)
★ “Part character study, part reckoning, this is a painful, magical gem of a novel that, even when it perplexes, will rip the hearts right out of its readers.” - Booklist (starred review)
“I was gripped by Adam’s journey to self-belief, told pacily, beautifully.” - London Times
★ “Ness manages to pack all this drama into a coherent and compulsively readable story line peopled with credible, rounded characters among the teens and the adults.” - School Library Journal (starred review)
“This compelling coming-of-age story will resonate with readers of all ages, and will remind everyone that the sun always rises again tomorrow.” - Brightly
“An extraordinary, ordinary day in the life of Adam Thorn. Seventeen-year-old, tall, white, blond, evangelical-raised Adam begins his day buying chrysanthemums for his overbearing, guilt-inducing mother. From the get-go, some readers may recognize one of many deliberate, well-placed Virginia Woolf references throughout the narrative. He goes on a long run. He has lunch with his bright, smart-alecky best friend, Angela Darlington, who was born in Korea and adopted by her white parents. In a particularly uncomfortable scene, he is sexually harassed by his boss. He also partakes in a 30-plus-page act of intimacy that leaves little to the imagination with his new boyfriend, Linus, also white. The scene is fairly educational, but it’s also full of laughter, true intimacy, discomfort, mixed feelings, and more that elevate it far beyond pure physicality. Meanwhile, in parallel vignettes, the ghost of a murdered teenage girl armed with more Woolf references eerily haunts the streets and lake where she was killed. Her story permeates the entire narrative and adds a supernatural, creepy context to the otherwise small town. What makes these scenes rise above the mundane is Ness’ ability to drop highly charged emotion bombs in the least expected places and infuse each of them with poignant memories, sharp emotions, and beautifully rendered scenes that are so moving it may cause readers to pause and reflect. Literary, illuminating, and stunningly told.” - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“As he does with conflicted teen Adam Thorn’s entire world, Patrick Ness will tear you apart and put you back together again in Release. Release is beautiful, enchanting, exquisitely written; the novel builds to an adrenaline-surged ending that only Patrick Ness can deliver. This is an incredible work of intertwined, mirrored stories that left me slack-jawed and in awe of one of the true master storytellers of our time.” - Andrew Smith, Michael L. Printz Honor–winning author of Grasshopper Jungle and Winger
“Release is beautiful, enchanting, exquisitely written; the novel builds to an adrenaline-surged ending that only Patrick Ness can deliver. This is an incredible work of intertwined, mirrored stories that left me slack-jawed and in awe of one of the true master storytellers of our time.” - Andrew Smith, Michael L. Printz Honor–winning author of Grasshopper Jungle and Winger
“Beautifully imagined and written, this is a marvelous book - marvelous in the truest sense of the word as in wonderful, surprising, extraordinary - all while it thoughtfully examines the complexities and entanglements of love, of hearts and spirits held captive and of the sweet, magical possibility of release. It is, in short, Ness at his best.” - Michael Cart
