The initial repetition of monster as Joan deliberates various meanings of the word is monotonous, but the story soon develops into a fast-paced thriller that blurs the division between villain and hero and features a deeply conflicted protagonist caught in the middle. They quickly learn that they are no safer in the past: Someone is hunting survivors throughout time and hiding evidence of the slaughter. Putting aside centuries of enmity between the Hunt and Oliver families, the two teens flee to the 1990s together, emerging in a time before either of them or the hero were born.

Vulnerable and uneducated about the world of monsters, Joan allies with Aaron Oliver, a White boy who is the only other living monster she can find. This hero’s arrival in London and the subsequent massacre of monsters in the city come as a shock, most of all to 16-year-old Joan Chang-Hunt, who only recently discovered that she’d inherited her deceased White English mother’s monster lineage (her human father is Chinese Malaysian). ĭive deep into the world of Only a Monster, where the line between monster and hero is razor thin: hidden worlds dwell in the shadows, beautiful monsters with untold powers walk among humans, and secrets are the most powerful weapon of all.Among monsters-beings with human appearances and the ability to travel through time by shortening humans’ life spans-there’s a myth about a human hero who threatens their entire existence. She’ll have to embrace her own monstrousness if she is to save herself, and her family. And Nick isn’t just a cute boy: he’s a legendary monster slayer, who will do anything to bring them down.Īs she battles Nick, Joan is forced to work with the beautiful and ruthless Aaron Oliver, heir to a monster family that hates her own. Her family aren’t just eccentric: they’re monsters, with terrifying, hidden powers. Then a Good Samaritan attempt gone wrong sends Joan spinning through time, and her life quickly begins to unravel. She loves her nerdy job at the historic Holland House, and when her super cute co-worker Nick asks her on a date, it feels like everything is falling into place. Sent to stay with her late mother’s eccentric family in London, sixteen-year-old Joan is determined to enjoy herself. ‘Mind-bending, heart wrenching, and unputdownable!’ Stephanie Garber, Sunday Times bestselling author of the Caraval series and Once Upon a Broken Heart

In every story there is a hero and a monster.

Only a monster vanessa len