Mister Monday

We listened to this book as we drove up and back for Thanksgiving. So fascinating.

Well written but more importantly, well wrought. This other world to which our world is just a satellite (one of the many "Secondary Realms"), with hints and smidges of God or Mother Earth creatures and right and wrong. A 9 year old boy is the protagonist and only succeeds through perseverence, support, and ingenuity. Delightful, if dark in places.

Arthur has an asthma attack on his first day of school, and as he lies dying on the oval, is visited by the strange Mister Monday who gives him a Minute Hand, one of the Keys to the kingdom. Mister Monday's plan is that Arthur is destined to die and by giving the key to someone about to become Nothing, Mister Monday will be able to keep the Key forever. But Arthur doesn't die and soon finds himself chased by the dog-faced, bowler-hatted Fetchers from another dimension that only he and a couple of other kids can see. Meanwhile, a plague is running out of control and Arthur is scared it will take his new family ( his original parents died many years ago). He agrees to help The Will ( a magical line of text taking the shape of a frog) try show more to defeat Mister Monday in return for a cure to the plague. But who can Will trust in this other dimension - who is telling the truth and who isn't? Nix has created fantastic terrifying villians, sublime side characters and other worlds that defy imagination. A lesser author would have bogged the reader down with the very complex plot details but Nix manages to keep the action flying from first to last page. No wonder this book is such a hit with the teenage boys. Great stuff! show less

Most people have described this as "not as in-depth as the Sabriel series", and I sort of agree with them. In a very half-hearted sort of way. It was definitely a quick and easy (and enjoyable!) way, but I don't think it really deserves the sort of "lesser" status that has been associated with it with the comparison with Sabriel.

Things do resolve quickly (like they did with Sabriel!), but there are very many big questions being brought up, about why/what/where are we? There are obvious parallels with a number of mythologies (Prometheus and the Old One; the winged servants and angels; all legends with a Creator) and as such, it taps into some of our biggest and most basic philosophical questions. While having fun, as our hero (the highly show more asthmatic Arthur Penhaligon) battles his way through 24 hours in the House to help free the Will of the Architect. It could be straightforward, but I think enough questions have been thrown up (where is the Architect? How will the Morrow Days be manifested? Is this heaven? What does the Will really want? What does the Architect really want? How on earth did such a highly improbable couple as Arthur's parents meet?) to keep us going for some time. (Or at least another six books!)

Also some interesting parallels with the fabulous Philip Pulman His Dark Materials series, with the missing Architect. (Although I feel this one will be less controversial...)

Looking forward to reading the rest in this series! show less

Arthur Penhaligon nearly dies from an asthma attack on a run at his new school, but while he is gasping out his last breaths, he is given a key, the minute hand of a very special clock, and suddenly everything changes. His asthma retreats, he starts being followed around by strange, dangerous creatures wearing bowler hats, and a deadly sleeping plague starts sweeping across his town. Arthur soon finds himself in a different world where a man named Mister Monday will stop at nothing to get the key back.

This was a compelling and, well, bizarre story. Arthur enters this mansion of a house that he can only see after he has the key, and he soon discovers that his quest is to gain the hour hand key to go with his minute hand one and defeat show more Mister Monday who has allowed the House to become corrupt. He goes along with the quest in order to find a cure for the plague that is sweeping his world. He meets many unusual characters and has some mind-twisting adventures, but it all comes together in a fascinating plot. One of the elements of the story that I really liked was the way that Arthur never knew who to really trust. I'll be moving on to the next in the series, Grim Tuesday ,soon. show less

I always find it difficult to review young adult novels. I understand that in terms of plot and plausibility, you're suppose to expect less, I'm just not sure why. I feel like young people are more apt to put a book down if the plot isn't tight as a drum.

I also need to remember that this is the first book in the series, but really, that's no excuse either. A novel should be self-contained and self-sufficient.

In short, I'm not quite sure what this book is doing. There are loads of literary references thrown into this book willy-nilly and I'm not really sure what they're doing there. The main character is named Arthur Penhaligan, an obvious reference to King Arthur, but seemingly the only one.

He gets a magical key which is really the show more minute hand of a clock and he's told he must assume control of part of a kingdom. We don't really ever learn why. This kingdom is ruled by seven people all named after days of the week (don't ask me) and also seem to each be characterized by one of the seven deadly sins (again, I don't know why). There are other references (e.g. Prometheus, Pied Piper) but never really explained.

I don't know, it all felt a bit disorganized, and the characters weren't properly developed. Arthur's kind of a wet blanket, and just lets everyone push him around. In the final battle with Monday, I actually got pretty bored. Probably because I knew he was going to win and nothing was really in jeopardy.

Ah well. This is probably why I don't read many kids books. show less

I enjoyed Garth Nix’s Booksellers series but the next one isn’t due out until 2026 so I decided to try The Keys to the Kingdom series. In the first book, "Mister Monday", Arthur Penhaligon was an asthmatic schoolboy on his last legs after a punishing run when strange being gave him a key shaped like a minute hand. The idea was that the gift giver would get it back moments later when Arthur died. Only he didn’t and soon he and the key were off on a quest to save his family and friends from the mysterious illness they couldn’t wake up from.
It was a fun foray into a world with strange beings and odd rules which Arthur had to circumnavigate while deciding who to trust and how to get through obstacles.

I'm pretty sure that Arthur died. He had a massive asthma attack, and, as his oxygen starved brain struggled its last, he hallucinated all of the rest. How else do you describe just how ... odd this book is.

That being said, I liked it. It's weird. Garth Nix really does his Proper Nouns. Everything felt like it Meant Something, although we never quite got a perfect idea what Anything was. Most of them were close enough though; so it goes. It's quick and the action picks you up and pulls you right through the story. When it's over, there's something of a feel of getting off a roller coaster, but in a good way.

Final thoughts: Is this series really going to take place over a week (Earth time)? All righty then.

Let's do it.