Bella at Midnight

I adored this book. I feel like I need to study it to see how she managed to make it so wonderful—I realize at least half of what makes it so good are the voices of the different characters, but how did she do that, make the likeable ones so likeable and the unlikeable ones still interesting and compelling? The voices are all different and yet there’s still an overall unifying quality to the tone/feel of the book as a whole.

This review is also available on my blog, Read Till Dawn.

So, I love The Silver Bowl books (link goes to my review of The Silver Bowl). I've had this earlier book by Stanley on my radar for a while, but it got buried under all the other books that were on my radar (i.e. it fell to somewhere in the middle of the infamous Goodreads "to read" pile). A month ago I made a Top Ten post listing ten books I can't believe I haven't read, and this was right near the top. I requested it right after posting the article, and read it in one day - as soon as I could wrestle it away from my mother, another Diane Stanley fan!

As an earlier work than the Silver Bowl series, you can see that Stanley's writing skills were still developing; the writing isn't show more quite a crisp as in her later series. However, considering how amazing those books are this really doesn't hurt Bella at Midnight very much. I initially thought the technique of telling the story from so many different POVs, switching every chapter between everyone from Bella to seemingly random people off the street, was clumsy and distracting. I soon realized, though, that the technique fit the story perfectly as all the threads began to weave together into one big, tightly knitted story.

Bella is a very interesting character, especially in comparison with the original Cinderella. Where Cinderella began life with a loving father but no real family outside of that, Bella grew up believing herself to be the peasant daughter of a loving couple. She has two siblings, village friends, and of course her best friend Prince Julian right by her side. When she is brought to her birth father's home to be lonely, abused, and neglected (not to a truly abusive state, but still pretty cruelly), she is homesick more than anything else. She doesn't dream of marrying a prince and riding off into the sunset; all she wants is to be back with the family who loves her. I love this, because at the end of the day it isn't wealth that matters to her: it's people. How can you not love a character with priorities like that? I won't pretend she's going on my list of "most memorable heroines" (if I were making that list, which I'm not), but she's definitely a engaging and sympathetic main character.

This is a fun, humorous twist of a classic fairy tale, one that I'm glad I read but I probably won't be in a huge hurry to reread. If you're looking for a well-written fairy-tale spinoff that messes everything up the time period and the happy ending, then this is most definitely the book for you! show less

A little too simple *for me* but a lot of wonderful stuff going on for the target audience. Mostly wholesome, the little bits of Christianity not too much, mostly creative... if your child can get past the beginning, the rest will be smooth sailing. I just want more depth & nuance.

I will consider more by the author.

I'm in the process of reading as many of the Georgia Children's Book Award nominees as I can, and this was about the 6th or 7th I've read. This version of Cinderella gave some interesting backstory for the evil stepmother and her daughters. I have to agree with the reviewers who said the multiple perspectives got confusing sometimes, but the voices sounded too similar as well. I did appreciate the social commentary about the dishonor of starting an unjustified war. Was this aimed at anyone we could name? Who knows?

Combining elements of Cinderella and Shakespeare, Diane Stanley's Bella at Midnight tells the story of young Bella, abandoned by her father, a knight, after her mother's death. Bella is surrendered to a surrogate family who raises her as their own in a family far lower on the social ladder than her real family. So Bella never learns to read or write or sit like a proper lady. Her family loves her and she is raised to be good and kind and honest.

Until one day her cold and somewhat disturbed father remarries and decides he wants her back. Bella's life is shaken up as she is transplanted into another family different from her own and where no one seems to really want her there. But when a war plot is discovered and Bella is the only one show more willing to stop it, she will leave behind everyone she knows to try make things right.

I enjoyed Stanley's novel for what it was. There was no over the top drama or huge earth shattering conflict. Everything resolves itself quickly and in a manner that allows good to always satisfyingly triumph over evil. It was a very pretty, catchy book with simple, pleasing characters who, if not exactly full of depth, are at least fun to be around for the duration of this quickly read novel. show less

Bella at Midnight is a fictional book about a young girl who is born to a crazy father. Her mother dies during childbirth and Bella's father blames her for the death of her mother. The girl is taken away as a foster child and lives as a peasant. She falls in love with a boy but he is taken away as part of a peace treaty. At this same time, Bella's father requests that she come back to live with him and his new wife and her daughters. Bella misses the life she lived as a peasant where she was loved. This book is a good choice because it is the appropriate length for students this age and it can also be used for comparing and contrasting because it is very similar to Cinderella.

Bella has grown up thinking that she was just a simple peasant girl. But suddenly, Bella's world collapses. First, her best friend, Julian, betrays her. Then she finds out that she is, in fact, Isabel, the daughter of a knight who abandoned her in infancy. Now he wants her back. Bella is torn from her beloved foster family and tries to accept her new life with her deranged father and his resentful wife.