Customer Reviews

Midnighters #1: The Secret Hour

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I greatly enjoyed reading The Midnighters: The Secret Hour by Scott Westerfeld, the first in the trilogy. It is a Young Adult novel, but is great for all ages and is built around very creative ideas. Everyone is sure to enjoy this YA fantasy that has suspense, some action, and some romance.

In Bixby, Oklahoma, there is a 25th hour that occurs at midnight. Everyone is frozen in their spots and technology stops working (ie. electricity, cars). Only the Midnighters are able to live through that hour, along side the creatures of the dark (darklings). Each Midnighter possesses their own special ability.

Jessica Day is new in town, recently having moved from Chicago. However, she is no ordinary newcomer, she is a Midnighter, but not a normal Midnighter either. With her arrival into town, the darklings start behaving abnormally in the secret hour.

What is Jessica's talent at midnight? Why are darklings behaving abnormally? Discover the secrets of Bixby and the rules of midnight.

Scott Westerfeld has done a marvelous job by mixing fantasy,mystery,science fiction and romance concisely. Such an exclusive and original story can only be created by a master-mind.
"Midnighters" as the title suggests is about group of 5 teenagers who roam Bixby, Oklahoma at the stroke of midnight for a WHOLE HOUR, which is the 25th hour exclusive to only them 5 while the entire Bixby is frozen stiffs. However,In this 25th hour, they are not alone! Darklings, ancient creatures whose mere existence goes back to the Stone Ages roam around freely, but they usually don't bother anyone;until Jessica Day moves to town. Apart from being a Midnighter,there is something special about Jessica that even the other four midnighters can not seem to wrap their minds around.
The darklings want her DEAD and they will surpass all boundaries to have her dead. Each Midnighter possesses a power (mindcasting,seer,polymath,flying) and then there is Jessica whose power is still unknown but interesting enough to send the scary and powerful darklings into a frenzy.
This book was like X-men with a whole new twist. Of course there was romance involved. No YA book is good without romance. Even though romance was not the central plot of this story, it was still dominant to give readers "awe" moments.
This books is very well-written with good character development. The POV of this book is very interesting because its told in a third-person, but in every chapter the narrator changes. This way you get a chance to get inside ALL midnighters heads and see the world from their vision. I loved how Scott did so flawlessly. At the end of each chapter, there is a symbol which belongs to each midnighter letting the reader know who was narrating a specific chapter.
This is the first book of the trilogy, so many would expect the ending to be a major cliff-hanger. I can gladly reassure you that this book is in no way a cliff-hanger. THANK GOD! It can be read as a stand-alone, although i would recommend to continue the trilogy since it only gets better and more questions will be answered.
Recommended to all YA lovers of fantasy,mystery,science fiction and romance.

Humans that are born at the stroke of midnight have the ability to access the secret 25th hour of the day. Wouldn't you like the extra hour? I know I would.

The promise that out there is something more than what we see and feel is really interesting and will definitely be appealing to those who like sci-fi books.

This is my first sci-fi book so it was kind of hard to get into but once that was over and I got to know the characters I found myself trying to find ways for the characters to escape..... not saying! J

The truth is these series have really stuck with me and days after I read them I was thinking about them. It has enough science stuff for those of you that are interested to know how things happened, like me, and it was simple enough for those who don't want to have a headache from the entire information overflow.

The characters were really unique and each one of them had a different talent. They call themselves Midnighters since they are the only humans that live in the secret hour but not for long because something dark out there wants them. These creatures, called daklings, are the other things that live or better exist at the secret hour. They only live at the 25th hour and that's a relief because they are after Jessica. But she has the help of 4 other Midnighters, all with special talents.

The writing was in third person narrative which is my favourite. A plus! You will find yourself turning the pages fast and eager to see what happens next.
I only gave it 2 stars because it was hard for me to get into and because there wasn't the love story I wanted to see but let me tell you the next books are better. This is the kind of series that gets better as it goes. So read it and then go for the next one!

I'm not usually into mystery or night books but this was a surprising exception. The only thing I thought about when I picked these books up was that the author was Scott Westerfeld and I've loved his previous titles. So I picked it up and it sat in my locker for about a week till I finally picked it up in a rush to find anything I could read. And it turned out pretty good and I can't wait for the next installment. The world Westerfeld created in Midnighters is eerie and for the anyone liking something to do with the supernatural will love this book.

Midnighters. At least that what they call themselves. Midnighters are the only ones who can move around in the blue hour, the secret time. When the clock strikes midnight everything in Bixby, Oklahoma freezes. At least all the daylighters freeze. The secret hour is inhabited by the dark forces, and of course the Midnighter. As the Midnighers fight for survival they uncover what is probably their biggest weapon in the fight for survival.

Jessica Day has just moved to Bixby, Oklahoma from Chicago with her family. Still trying to find her niche in the local high school, she's noticed by a group of students who are very different from your average teens. Not to mention that her dreams at night are becoming very, very vivid--such as the fact that for one hour at midnight, time seems to literally stand still.

Such is the life of the Midnighters, a group of teens who were born at midnight and have the ability to see the "blue time", the twenty-fifth hour of the day where time stands still for everyone else. Each of the group has a special power, both in and out of the blue time--Rex is a Seer, Dess is a Polymath, Melissa is a Mindcaster, and Jonathan is an Acrobat.

Jess is, of course, skeptical at first that time is actually standing still, and that her new rag-tag group of friends has special powers. But soon unmistakable proof arises that the arrival of Jessica Day in Bixby is causing change--the creatures of the blue time are becoming dangerous and seem to want her dead.

Jess needs to find out her own special power before something bad happens to the town and it's midnight inhabitants. As the group struggle to keep the night creatures away, it's up to Jess to discover which power she possesses that's making everyone so nervous.

I LOVED this book! A totally original concept, Scott Westerfeld has created a series with truly interesting characters and crystal-clear visualization. I can't wait to read the next book in the series, to see where the Midnighters go from here.

Definitely a recommended read!

Reviewed by: Jennifer Wardrip, aka "The Genius"

"Crazehlicious" is a made up word but, if it were real, it would be the perfect comment for this book. The plot is great, the characters realistic and the problem far fetched, but curiously intriguing.

The book for me was a fast paced page-turner where the book went from spellbinding fear and suspence, to revelation, and then more suspense. The storyline was amazing and while it gave you a feeling like something is obvious but you cant put your finger on it, i must say there was some amazing use of forshadowing!

I must amend Scott Westerfield on delivering another amazing book, that was equally interesting and creative. I give my highest recommendations for this book, wich is now my favorite book (I cant wait to get the sequel.)

FIVE THUMBS UP! (Or 65 if you do the math...)

And now it's my favorite book of all time! Who knew? Anyone who picks up this book will be imediately hooked. The pace of this book never slows down.

When Jessica Day moves to Bixby, she never expected that she would discover a secret world, Midnight, and the strange teens alone that live in it. Rex reads the lore, Melissa is a pyschic, Dess does math, and Jonathan flys. Each of them have their own talent at Midnight, but Jessica can't seem to figure out what hers is. Sometimes it seems like she's not even a real midnighter.

"Maybe you're not," Melissa said. "Not a real one, anyway. Something about you is so....... 11:59. You don't belong."

This is deffinatly a book worth reading over and over......

I wasn't sure what to expect when I started reading this book. It starts out with the 'new kid at a new school' thing. Sounds kind of dull, but get past that. I'm glad I did! I really enjoyed this book quite a lot. It's spooky, funny, exciting...the pages turn themselves...and at the end you really want more. I saw here at Amazon that part 2 doesn't come out until next year. Well, I can't wait. Hopefully after all is written someone has the sense to make a film out of this. It's definitely worthy!

"Melissa didn't know exactly what to think of the new girl. Below her shifting emotions was an unexpected flavor, a sharp metal taste, like a coin pressed against the tip of Melissa's tongue. The scent of unbridled energy was everywhere, but maybe that had just been the storm. And of course, someone new was always full of unfamiliar flavors, unexpected faculties. Each of Melissa's friends felt different to her, after all. But Jessica Day felt more than different."

Jessica thought she was just like any other teenager when her family moved from suburban Chicago to Bixby, Oklahoma. She was restless, lonely, dissatisfied and trying to "adjust." Her ambitious mother was distracted with work and her father was a boring stay-at-home dad. But from her first day at Bixby High she sensed that there was something definitely "different" afoot. She knew that she was being seen as more than the new kid in town and that there was something special about her.

Rex, Melissa, Dess and Jonathan are Midnighters. Each has a special power that helps them through the blue, frozen hour of midnight in Bixby. Rex is the historian, Melissa is highly psychic, Dess is a math genius and Jonathan can defy gravity. Together they help protect the little town from the slithers and darklings who come during the secret hour. Now that they have met Jessica they must figure out why the dark forces are bent on killing her and, in the end, what kind of power this Jessica has.

Put all these ingredients together, plus a growing romance between Jessica and Jonathan, and you have a fast-paced, creative fantasy as only Scott Westerfeld can write. Picture Buffy meeting superheroes, and you get the idea of the pace and direction of this adventure. Not only would this book translate beautifully into a TV series, it could also succeed, with the right art work, as a graphic novel. Readers will be fully tantalized waiting for the next two installments of this trilogy.

--- Reviewed by Sally M. Tibbetts (...)

A wonderful book that will entrance all in its mind pleasing description of the wonderful midnight world. The nightlings fighting to destroy their soon to be greatest enemy, a simple 15 year old girl, Jessica Day. The characters each holding onto a special gift. A Seer, a Mindcaster, a Polymath, and an Acrobat. All of these things will help them find Jessica's gift, and protect her from the nightlings. But along with unraveling the mystery of Jessica Day, they also start to discover, and solve, other mysteries. Such as why they had never seen so many nightlings, or why it seems that only their town can experience the true midnight. What will the next book hold for these exciting characters?