Spoiler Free Summary:
Midnighters: The Secret Hour centers on five kids in small town Bixby, Oklahoma. Namely the new girl to town, Jessica Day, who can't help noticing the three outcasts of school Rex, Dess, and Melissa. Quiet, mysterious, and each donning thick glasses they stand out from the typical crowd of the rest of the high school. It doesn't help that Dess begins mentioning strange things about the history of Bixby and strange dreams that Jessica might start to have. True to her word, Jessica wakes ups at exactly midnight to everything frozen in place and shrouded in blue light. It just trips everything up-throw in Johnathan; the friendly guy at the high school who might be hiding a secret; and you've got the Midnighters; a group of kids born precisely within a second of midnight thus unlocking them a 25th hour of the day where everything (time lncluded) is frozen; giving them, and the dark creatures and Slithers that lurk in the shadows, free realm of the town and super powers. That is until the creatures decide that Jessica is more important then the others know and that she needs to be killed...whatever it takes.I suck at summaries...sorry about that. I definitely was skeptical about this book when I first picked it up at the library. I have read Scott Westerfeld's Uglies Series and wasn't the biggest fan, and the fact that this book doesn't even have an official page on Goodreads made me super wary as to how good the book actually would be. I was VERY PLEASANTLY surprised! This novel was like if the Maximum Ride Series had a baby with the Percy Jackson series and then was raised by the Gravity Falls fandom; it was some intense, easy to follow, page turning sci-fi/fantasy! I'm actually really surprised this book doesn't have more raves, because honestly...I enjoyed it way more than I should have! So, without spoiling anything...and I mean anything, just go read this book please. Do it. This is a great lazy day summer reading book when you want some action, but not a throbbing brain. You can thank me later.
*SPOILER ALERT SPOLER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT*
This is now the moment where if you haven't read the book you should turn your eyes around...unless you happen to like getting spoiled and are more curious about my thoughts towards this book you've never read....go right ahead. If you are one of the rare people who has read this book than I applaud you, and welcome you to share in my reviewing of this book. Tell me what you thought in the comments below! Now onto my actual thoughts on the novel....1) I LOVED the characters and the use of individuality and originality
It's so easy in sci-fi/fantasy to have those cliche characters that you can't help feeling like they were copy and pasted from some other work. Westerfeld, in my opinion, did a fantastic job giving us realistic 15 year old's and characters that...while we might not be able to relate to their quirky behaviors, don't leave us confused and distant from. Take Jessica for example: New kid, totally oblivious to how the blue time works and the whole concept of Midnighters, wanting to fit in, yada yada yada, as a teenager who has moved to a small town and experienced exactly what Jessica was going through I 100% agree with all her actions. Not once was I cringing at the probability of a reaction to a situation or scratching my head wondering why in the world she was acting the way she was. I believed every one of her intentions.
Dess, Rex, and Melissa even were totally amazing characters in terms of outcasts. I mean, even just Melissa constantly with headphones on and her baggy sweaters and Dess maybe too creepy with the stares towards new kids...we all know those kids from high school. We've all been in classes with those types of people; and I just give extra cookie points to Scott Westerfeld for really expanding on a cast of young adults who really could have been surface characters easily, but were carefully plotted out with care. :)
Last, but not least, Johnathan....oh Johnathan. I wanted to scoop this boy up the minute he first invited Jessica to his table at lunch; and then the whole window thing? Boy, oh boy...there is nothing I love more than unknown fictional hotties who I can just love without competition. Sure Johnathan was flawed; the whole criminal curfew record thing...who doesn't love a bad boy? I think the thing that made these characters so likable, was that even though they had flaws...their flaws were almost always an unavoidable issue due to the midnight hour. (Except Rex's problem with Johnathan and constant freaking our about the lore...seriously? That got kinda annoying...)
2) The Concepts of Their Powers and the Blue Time
Although at times, the orgins of these "special abilities" seemed a bit unclear to me, I didn't really care because they were FREAKING AWESOME! (In their own quirky little ways) I was just so facinated by these gifts and the whole thing with the blurry glasses. I think Westerfeld had some great world building in this and really put a lot of time into this novel. Leave it to him to write a book where you have to fight off evil shapeshifting panthers with math. That being said, there were a few times when my mind was running circles about the blue time and how all the creatures were there....I know they explained some stuff, but I feel like I'm not satisfied enough yet. Hopefully, in book two we can get more of an expansion on the world and laws of the blue time and the creatures that inhabit it! Ahhh, I just really enjoyed this book.
(Plus, it wasn't just me who got really freaked out with the whole slithers chase on night #2, and when that thing morphed into thousands of spiders? Egfsakdff, I had shivers down my spine!!)
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