The Knife of Never Letting Go is the first book of the Chaos Walking book series. Patrick Ness is the author of the book. The main characters of the book are Todd Hewitt, Manchee (Todd’s dog), Viola Eade, Aaron, Benison “Ben” Moore, Cillian Boyd, Davy Prentiss, Jr., and Mayor/President David Prentiss.
The story is about a boy (Todd Hewitt) who lives in a town, called Prentisstown, where everyone has “Noise”. “Noise” is where everyone and every animal can hear your thoughts and secrets. The town only has 147 men in it and 0 women. The young boys learn that the native species “Spackle” gave the people the “Noise germ” that killed half the men and all the women.
In Prentisstown, you turn a man at age 13. Todd has a month and is counting down the days to become a man because all the other older boys had stopped talking to him once they became men. Ben and Cillian (Todd’s guardians) sent him out on his own with his dog, Manchee, to go out on his own to find the town called “Haven”.
On his way out, he hears and feels something that he has never felt or heard before. He could feel a “silence” coming from an old “Spackle” building and Manchee can feel it , too. Manchee would bark “Quiet! Quiet, Todd.” to Todd whenever he would feel it.
They found out that it was an actual, in the flesh, girl that has the “silence”. Todd realized that he couldn’t read her thoughts but that she could read his. They have an argument and Aaron (the preacher) comes out and attacks the girl. Todd has the knife that Ben gave him for the 13th birthday in his hand but didn’t have the wrong mind to kill Aaron.
Todd found out that the girl’s name is Viola Eade and that she came from a settler ship that crashed landed, killing her parents. They go on a long journey hiding and running from the “army” of Mayor Prentiss.
They start their journey together heading towards Haven. They meet obstacles on the way. Some obstacles caused a lot of pain, and some caused pain to others.
They make it to Haven to find out that there was no one there. Then a voice spoke, and that is the end of Book 1 of the Chaos Walking series.