Awards

• Commended for Capitol Choices: Noteworthy Books for Children and Teens (Fourteen and Up) 2011
• Commended for Michael L. Printz Award (Young Adult) 2011
• Commended for Mildred L. Batchelder Award (Children's) 2011
• Commended for Mildred L. Batchelder Award 2011

Overview

When Pierre-Anthon realizes there is no meaning to life, the seventh-grader leaves his classroom, climbs a tree, and stays there. His classmates cannot make him come down, not even by pelting him with rocks. So to prove to Pierre-Anthon that life has meaning, the children decide to give up things of importance. The pile starts with the superficial--a fishing rod, a new pair of shoes. But as the sacrifices become more extreme, the students grow increasingly desperate to get Pierre-Anthon down, to justify their belief in meaning. Sure to prompt intense thought and discussion, Nothing--already a treasured work overseas--is not to be missed.

Full Product Details

9781416985792

Table of Contents

Reviews

Indelible, elusive, and timeless, this uncompromising novel has all the marks of a classic. A group of Danish seventh-graders have their insulated suburban world jolted when classmate Pierre Anthon stands up and announces, Nothing matters. He promptly takes up residence in a plum tree and creates an existential crisis among the group with his daily reports on the pointlessness of life. Feeling a need to refute the alarming notion, the kids decide to assemble a pile of objects that will prove Pierre Anthon wrong. It starts simply: Agnes gives up her favorite shoes; Dennis, his beloved books. But as each sacrifice grows in intensity, each kid enacts revenge by demanding an ever-greater sacrifice from the next. With chilling rapidity, the heap of meaning, which they keep stored in an abandoned sawmill, is towering with gut-wrenching artifacts of their loss of innocence--if innocence is something that ever existed. Teller offers just enough character detail to make the suffering and cruelty palpable. The terse purposefulness of her prose may put off some readers, but that singularity is also what will endure the test of time. Already a multiple award winner overseas, this is an unforgettable treatise on the fleeting and mutable nature of meaning. -- Daniel Kraus, Booklist STARRED REVIEW

The seventh graders of Taering School are much like any others, until Pierre Anthon has an existential crisis, climbs a tree and refuses to come back to school. The other students can't live their lives as usual with one of their classmates sitting in a tree, pelting them with unripe plums every morning and yelling, In a few years you'll be dead and forgotten and diddly-squat, nothing. Determined to prove to Pierre Anthon that life has plenty of meaning, the students embark on a dire quest. Over the course of many months, each student is required to give up something full of meaning, something chosen by the previous sacrificing student. The sacrificial items start small--a favorite pair of shoes, a fishing pole--but become more and more dreadful as the pile of meaning grows. Quietly and without fanfare, the students' adventure develops into one that rivals Lord of the Flies for horror. The matter-of-fact, ruthlessly logical amorality of these teens is chilling. Gorgeously lyrical,

Author Information

Janne Teller was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, and has written several award-winning novels that have been translated into a number of languages. Nothing is the winner of the prestigious Best Children's Book Award from the Danish Cultural Ministry and is also a Printz Award Honor Book in the United States. Janne lives in New York City and Denmark. Martin Aitken has a doctorate in linguistics and has translated hundreds of articles, poems, and novels. Born in England, he lives in Copenhagen, Denmark.

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