Night Road by Kristin Hannah wasn't a great read, but not bad either. I like how the book focused on many different characters, especially Jude's point of view. The story is also long-term, thus it continues into the later years of the characters as they get older, which is different from many other books I've read. I really like how Night Road teaches important lessons on parenting, friendship, alcohol drinking, high school drama, etc.
I don't want to repeat what is already online about this book, so I'll just talk about specific parts and characters worth mentioning. Jude is described as a "helicopter" mom. She is into the lives of her twins more than typical parents. This is her way of being the overprotective parent that is familiar to many kids. While it gets to be too much involvement on Jude's part, parents that care about their children isn't a bad thing. Too much however, can lead to rebellion and lack of independence. Back to Jude. Her careful parenting skills fails her when she lets her guard down and gives permission to Zach and Mia one night. This one mistake affects all of the character's lives for a little more than half the book.
One really interesting part of the novel was the inclusion of a "little" character. This one addition brings up new events and decisions to be made in the other character's lives. While reading these parts, I couldn't help but be reminded how unfortunately, innocent children suffer in between the problems of adults.
While there were good parts, what I didn't like was the inappropriate behavior of some of the characters. I don't know if I personally would recommend this to young adults or an older audience, even though much of Night Road is about the teenager characters growing up and what they face, but also includes a lot of the parent's perspective. The plot also got drawn out and a bit tiring to read eventually. But, the last chapter brought the book to a good end and was worth reading till the end.
To read the description of Midnight Angels on goodreads.com, click the title.
I don't want to repeat what is already online about this book, so I'll just talk about some parts I thought were good. Those who know me well, know that I hate bugs and rodents. But, the creatures known as squillos in Midnight Angels had great descriptions that I read it over and over again. I could just imagine how it looks by the way the author wrote about them. Carcaterra wrote, "They are a hybrid, a mixture of water rat, eel, beaver, and God only knows what else... They have very sharp front teeth and will look to wrap themselves around your lower limbs and then bite into the veins just below the back of you legs" (147-148). These squillos were mentioned by the Raven to Vittorio who failed in retrieving the Angels. To find out the fate of Vittorio, read the book ;)
Another part I found interesting was the conversation between Edwards and the Raven about Kate (166-170). Edwards was trying to convince the Raven to not harm Kate in the middle of the battle between the Vittoria Society and the Immortals in getting the legendary Midnight Angels by Michelangelo. But the Raven would stop at nothing to get the Angels, even murdering Kate, who may just be his daughter!
What makes Midnight Angels a crime fiction novel is of course all the crime fighting and murder. Although I would hate to watch anything where people kill each other, reading this wasn't bad. In Midnight Angels, many characters die to protect Kate and the Angels. One of them dies surrounded by fire in their shop, courtesy of the Raven. And of course, one of the main characters gets murdered in a battle with the Raven. The ending of the novel is surprising, but is worth reading till the end. I would recommend this book to those who like crime fiction or Art History (and maybe a fan of The Da Vinci Code ;)
If you would like to purchase a copy of Midnight Angels: A Novel
by Lorenzo Carcaterra, then click the title.
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