This a story about a teenager, Conor, whose mother is terminally ill. It's a story about what gets people through the day when something as awful enters their life. Conor meets a monster who tells him three stories, three tales with contradictive morale. He feels like nobody understands him: his Dad lives in America with his new family and doesn't want Conor there, his grandma is obsessed with her own feelings, his friends are no longer his friends, but mostly because he rejected their help himself. So there's nothing left for Conor, but nightmares and The Monster. 
 The book is very beautiful with truly dark and atmospheric illustrations by Jim Kay, the plot is more than sad, however, being into books about terminally ill people, I must say that I've read more haunting and emotionally strong stories, so A Monster Calls was a little bit disappointing. It is an easy to read book, but I don't think that stories like that should be easy. Although I felt sorry for Conor and his mom, at moments it didn't seem real and a lot of the scenes were like copy-pasted from a standard American movie about cancer patients. 
 Nonetheless, I don't regret reading this book - holding something so beautiful and flipping real illustrated paper pages after several months of e-reading was a nice experience and the plot itself was good too.