Last Night I Sang to the Monster

Saenz, Benjamin A. (2009). Last night I sang to the monster. Cinco Puntos Press: El Paso, TX. Zach is in rehab and he fighting alcoholism and more. He is fighting a monster that haunts his dreams and lingers with the fear it produces when he is awake. He comes from a troubled family where his dad drinks to oblivion, his mom wants him to touch her like a husband and his older brother runs the house all the while beating the crap out of Zach.  Zach maintains A’s and a cover story to explain away his pain by keeping mostly to himself and retreating with alcohol and drugs. Still, he has to figure out how he got to rehab. He has to sing to his monster like a parent sings to a child to chase away the dreams. He has to remember how his brother killed his parents then killed himself in front of him. He has to believe that God did write happiness on his heart, which he did. The language of the book jarred me at first. The book is real and raw and yet there is hope. There has to be hope to stop the characters from killing themselves. Because of the level of understanding required to relate and comprehend, this is a book for the mature young adult. Well worth the read and could even be used for counseling. Havighurst's Theory of Developmental Tasks With adolescents undergo changing relationships with parents. Zach comes to terms with the fact that his parents are dead but also that they never were parents at all. He works though identifying his counselor and roommate as father figures.