Skip to main content Currently Reading Book World: 50 years later, 'The Monster at the End of This Book' is still selling - and inspiring authors Danny Freedman, The Washington Post Jan. 27, 2021 FacebookTwitterEmail The Monster at the End of This BookGolden Books - handout As a 4-year-old, Brad Parks was so ravenous for "The Monster at the End of This Book" that his older brother - facing endless requests to read the story - finally recorded a version on an audio cassette. For Parks, now an accomplished author, the book was a formative introduction to suspense. "The fact is," he says, "I am 46 years old, I write thrillers for adults, and in some ways all I've ever tried to do is replicate 'The Monster at the End of This Book.' There is a monster at the end of all of my novels, and I want you to feel this unbearable compulsion to turn pages and find out what it is."