It's a risky choice and not everyone will like it, but I do. Billy himself narrates in his illiterate but vivid way and this is another device often used by Almond. This is David Almond's first novel for adults and it treads ground that will be very familiar to his legions of young fans: spirituality, magic, the darkness in organised religion, and a central character who is a young boy both threatened and tempted by violence. Is this the destiny his parents foresaw for him? Or is it a conceit? A pride? When a shadowy figure from his past appears, Billy, at last, comes face to face with the one who is beyond healing, the one against whom he must prevail. Word spreads, and soon people are coming from far and wide, while Billy is treated as a prophet. With Missus Malone, Billy communicates with the dead and discovers a gift for healing.

And at that point, the naive and almost illiterate Billy emerges into the world under the tutelage of his mother, a kindly butcher, and a psychic. There he stays until his father mysteriously disappears. His birth coincided with an apocalyptic bombing and his parents have hidden him away from the ruins and the catastrophe in a single room, both out of shame and in the belief that his coming into the world and surviving at such a violent moment signifies a sacred future. The Monster Billy Dean tells the story of Billy, a boy born into the dystopia of a war-torn town and the product of an illicit liaison between a young woman and her priest. I am not cleva, so forgiv my folts and my mistayks. This tale is told by 1 that died at birth by 1 that came into the world in days of endles war & at the moment of disaster. Longlisted for the CILIP Carnegie Medal 2013

David almond first book