David Almond’s novels all have a unique, mystical thread running through them. He weaves a story web, spider-like, that holds the reader spellbound while he spins new thought-threads on universal themes: good versus evil, nature versus nurture, appearance versus reality, through the depiction of his various characters and the settings in which he places them. Clay is no exception. Here is a story about the friendship between two boys, Davie and Geordie, and the havoc wrought in their lives with the arrival of the stranger, Stephen Rose. Like Skellig in the book if the same title, Almond creates a character that defies type-casting. He appears to exert a force field over and around Davie (as Skellig does round Michael and Mina) luring him in a way that both fascinates and repels him. But whereas the character of Skellig is a benign influence, the strength of the force that emanates from Stephen Rose is one of darkness and menace. He reveals to Davie his capacity to make inanimate objects come to life and, with Davie, creates a monster out of clay that Stephen aims to use for his own destructive purposes.

 ‘ “Now. Come into the world. Come to me, Stephen Rose. I call on you. Live, my creature. Move.”
 And I see the man move. His limbs twitch, he turns his head, and look straight into Stephen Rose’s eyes.’

Davie is both impressed and appalled. He has to grapple with the implications of what he has helped to create and struggles to understand just what type of 'friend' he is dealing with. Just who is Stephen and where does he come from? Is he real or a figment of his imagination? Will he succeed in his aim to create total devastation by making the monster obey his destructive commands? Does Davie have any power to stop him? Having created the monster together, together they are both responsible for the force they have unleashed. Almond explores the effect this has on Davie and how he tries to resolve it – but 'resolve' is not what Stephen has in mind.

 Every word carefully chosen, Almond's novel makes compelling reading. While it appears to be a deceptively easy read, it covers a range of weighty themes written with extraordinary deftness: he not only examines the fluidity of boyhood friendships but also the volatility of teenage/parent relationships. He makes us question fundamental, religious beliefs through the weak-minded priest Father O’ Mahoney, and enlists our sympathy for the mentally vulnerable in the form of Aunt Mary (the relative over whom Stephen Rose exerts his cruel influence). In the final pages Almond does not shirk from dealing with a potentially very uncomfortable dénouement. He expertly manages to lower the reader safely out of the story web with our thought-threads rearranged but intact.