Bright Midnights – LS Delorme

Pages: 307
Released On: 29/09/2023

Most high school students find life challenging, but 17-year old Amelie has a lot more to contend with than typical teenage angst. Ever since she turned 11, others have been irresistibly drawn to her—with tragic consequences. Her only escape is at night when she flies to different times and places through her “dreams”. Her life begins to change when, on one of her flights, she meets Clovis, an alluring and mysterious young man who hides a secret.

As Amelie finds herself increasingly drawn to him, she learns his story, how it intertwines with her own and finally discovers how to live her life in the real world. Until her own secrets are revealed to the wrong people and that world turns upside down.

*****

Thanks to Literally PR for the gifted copy of this book in return for an honest review and spot on the book tour.

This is the second book in the series, and I hadn’t read the first one and so was worried it would be difficult to get into, but I don’t think it was.

I mean, I obviously don’t know what I’ve missed from the first one…as I’ve missed it, but I never felt at a disadvantage starting with this one. I mean, I’m sure as with any series you get to know characters and pick up on little things, but like I say, I didn’t feel like I missed out by not reading book one.

Generally speaking, I am not a huge fan of big sections of description as I feel it can often take you out of the story and feel more like a creative writing task. And the first page of this is all description of the weather and the woods and whatnot, but it didn’t feel jarring. In fact, it was the opposite, drawing me in and setting up what sounded like a magical story.

I enjoyed the idea that magic and powers might not always be a positive. Generally – and this is a generalisation and only my opinion – but I find magical things in books are always a good thing, an exciting thing. But I imagine, as a young kid or a teenager, especially a teenage girl, being different must be really difficult as it’s a time where you do all you can to NOT be different.

I liked Amelie. Yes she’s clearly got something going on that’s a bit weird, and she’s drawing attention, not all of it good, but I liked her initially. She didn’t even have to try hard to get me on her side, she was just so naturally bright that I was willing to go on this journey.

I admit that at times I felt there were perhaps one too many subplots. I don’t mean this as a negative per se, but more because I wanted more. I wanted more focus on sibling rivalries, on school friendships, on school dangers, on secrets etc. They were sort of touched upon but not really developed. But I read somewhere that the author is building up to something in the third book so perhaps that’s the reason why.

It was intriguing. Amazon says it’s an YA novel which iI agree with, but it also held my attention as a not-so-young-adult straight away.

I felt it was well written, with an interesting storyline, layered characters, and magical elements, twists and turns etc. There were perhaps a few too many explicit suggestions perhaps. They didn’t offend me in any way, but I kept noticing them which took me out of the story a bit, they didn’t seem worked in quite as seamlessly as everything else.

But overall I’m pleased I’ve read it. She’s a new author to me and one I’ll keep an eye out for. It’s well written and intriguing and exciting. A solid 4 stars! Not perfect but with a lot of really great stuff (which is why I don’t normally do star ratings as I don’t feel it encapsulates my opinion properly).