The Girl at Midnight by Melissa Grey Series: The Girl at Midnight
Published by Delacorte Press on April 28, 2015
Pages: 357
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Magic lives in our darkest corners.
Beneath the streets of New York City live the Avicen, an ancient race of people with feathers for hair and magic running through their veins. Age-old enchantments keep them hidden from humans. All but one. Echo is a runaway pickpocket who survives by selling stolen treasures on the black market, and the Avicen are the only family she' s ever known.
Echo is clever and daring, and at times she can be brash, but above all else she' s fiercely loyal. So when a centuries-old war crests on the borders of her home, she decides it' s time to act.
Legend has it that there is a way to end the conflict once and for all: find the firebird, a mythical entity believed to possess power the likes of which the world has never seen. It will be no easy task, though if life as a thief has taught Echo anything, it' s how to hunt down what she wants…and how to take it.
But some jobs aren' t as straightforward as they seem. And this one might just set the world on fire.
I am glad I read this book a year after it released. I originally wanted to read it upon release day because there was so much hype about it in the blogger world/twitterverse. But again, so glad I did not. I think I would have been monumentally disappointed if I had. Instead, I was just a little disappointed after reading it last week.
The poetic name and aesthetic appeal of the novel set the bar pretty high for what I was expecting and it is not that I was disappointed with the story itself, but in the way it was delivered.
Ran across this on Polyvore and it reminded me of TGaM cover:
The Girl at Midnight came across as a mid-grade level read for me, and I was expecting something a lot darker and bad-ass in tone I guess. A lot of the dialogue came off as too cheesy/trying too hard when it came to the comic relief attempts throughout the story. Despite that, there were descriptions and sentences scattered throughout the novel that were poetic in their delivery, and I continued reading the book for those moments.
As for the plot/storyline, fans of The Mortal Instruments, The Vampire Diaries, Aladdin, and the old-school X Men cartoons will enjoy the familiar feel that The Girl at Midnight evokes. The story still maintains an entertaining uniqueness even if some of the characters and story threads seem plucked from other popular series.
I enjoyed the dynamic between all of the characters. Echo, the main female protagonist, was easy to relate to and fall for because of her background and love of libraries, literature, and languages. I enjoyed her role throughout the story and I think I will like her even more in the next novel.
The story world is both in and out of this world. I think the setting(s) was probably my favorite aspect of The Girl at Midnight. I mean, who hasn’t dreamt of living in their own secret nook hidden in the New York Public Library?! I also loved that Echo was able to globetrot in search of mystical clues via the use of magic and the ”in between” .
Have you read The Girl at Midnight? I’d love to hear your thoughts on it in the comment section below.
I liked your review. I laughed out loud when I read: “I mean, who hasn’ t dreamt of living in their own secret nook hidden in the New York Public Library?!”