Clay by David Almond

I was never a fan of ‘young adults genre’ but all that changed after having a teen at home. Its a genre every parent should read I feel. Off late, I’ve got my hands on some really interesting young adults novels.

My latest read is Clay by critically acclaimed British author David Almond. He is an award winning author with several novels for children and young adults. In fact he is the winner of Hans Christian Andersen Award, the world’s most prestigious prize in children’s literature.

The story of Clay begins in a small town of Felling, where good friends Davie and Geordie are altar boys in their local Catholic church. They are good boys basically, but once in a while steal their father’s cigarettes.

The two boys are full of mischief and usually keep away from Mouldy, the school bully. Things change when Stephen Rose comes to town to live with his crazy Aunt Mary. Stephen is a strange boy who’s father is dead and mother is being treated in a mental asylum. He was recently kicked out of seminary school. He befriends Davie and Geordie.

There is a rift between Davie and Geordie when Stephen gets closer to Davie. Stephen is a good sculptor and has a supernatural power of creating life from clay. He is an evil boy who uses his sculptures for pure evil. Davie gets influenced by him and joins him and there is big change in Davie from a nice young boy into a wicked person.

What happens next? Will Davie realize he is not doing the right thing or is it too late!

I will recommend Clay for teenagers as well as adults. There is not a single dull moment in the novel. Its an eerie, dark, disturbing and thought provoking novel.

Below is my favorite quote from Clay:

“I do think there is evil. But it is very rare. It is rare as true goodness. And just as true goodness produces rare saints, true evil produces rare monsters. The rest of us are semi-good, semi-bad, and we live our lives in a kind of half-happy, half-sad daze. We might hope that one sunny morning we find ourselves in the presence of a saint. And we must pray that we do not encounter the monster.”