Past Midnight

If you're looking at the post before this and thinking, "What? There is no way she could have possibly finished this book so fast!", I understand. However I assure you, I really did. Read below to find out why!

Charlotte and her sister Annalise help their parents debunk "ghost stories" by proving their scientific origins. The question is: What happens if there is one that you just can't seem to disprove?

As a reader, and I know I say this often, it is extremely important that I feel invested in the characters if I am going to truly love a story. That being said, Charlotte and Annalise are superb protagonists! Their personalities meld beautifully and you can feel the sisterly chemistry between them. I personally loved Charlotte! She was show more spunky, sweet and driven. What I was most impressed by was that even the secondary characters, like Avery and Noah, had an amazing story line and were well developed. It's hard not to find yourself drawn into their story.

Past Midnight is a very fast paced and slightly spooky read. I warn you, if you are the type who has nightmares based on horror or suspense movies, you may not want to read this before bed. Although I don't think Mara set out with the intention to scare her readers, some parts of the book will definitely raise the hair on the back of your neck! I had to read another book for a few chapters before bed and even then I had ghosts haunt my dreams for the night.

As I'm sure you can tell, I absolutely adored Past Midnight! The story is the perfect blend of ghost story, coming of age story, and sweet romance. If you're shaking your head in amazement, don't despair. That is precisely what I felt the moment I reached the ending of the book. Mara Purnhagen manages to mesh all of these topics into a well paced book that will have you reading as fast as you possibly can. show less

I have to say that I really enjoyed this book. I originally purchased this book for my Kindle because I received the second novel in this series from NetGalley for review and I am so glad that I did. I wasn`t sure what to expect as the last couple of YA books I have read had been a bit disappointing. I started reading this book on my last day in Barbados and it didn`t take me very long to be drawn into Charlotte`s world. I have always preferred a good ghost story to vampires, zombies, werewolves or angels and this story didn`t disappoint. I could completely relate to Charlotte as I moved cities and high schools halfway through grade 12 (at the time here in Ontario we went up to grade 13 so that meant I only had a year and half left to show more graduate). I moved for completely different reasons than Charlotte. I can`t say that it was because my parents were doing something cool like hunting for ghosts but I have to say that it is quite intimidating coming into a new school when people have already established and kept friendships for many years. I had also been a bit of a nerd or geek (not sure which one I would qualify as) and I had definitely been made of in the past. I was quite thankful to find an amazing group of friends; friends who I am still to this day close with. I have digressed a bit from the review but all that is to say that I can relate to Charlotte and I think that made me enjoy the book even more. While the story centers on ghosts, both emotional ghosts from the past and also the spooky kind that haunt houses, I never felt that anything was forced. The ghosts just sort of flowed into the narrative of the story and it didn`t seem out of the ordinary or over the top. Overall I give this book 4.5 stars out of 5 and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a fun read. show less

Got an ARC of this book straight from Harlequin YA Paranormal, and I must say I was very pleasantly surprised by its quality and readability.

Charlotte Silver is the oft-overlooked younger sister in a family of ghost hunters. This is less weird than it sounds. Charlotte's parents do not actually believe in ghosts, they're more interested in disproving claims of hauntings while being unable to explain away a couple of strange "energy patterns" they've come across in their career.

Anyway, Charlotte happens to trigger some actual, somewhat malevolent sleeping ghosties during a filming session with her parents and older sister. The haunting begins in earnest as Charlotte begins to have cryptic dreams about a girl from the past century, and show more sinister thuds and thumps and thrown furniture begin to hammer in the ghostly message: find the dead girl, and somehow reunite her with her even deader parents.

And meanwhile Charlotte copes with starting her senior year at a new high school where a mysterious tragedy occurred last year, a new friend with big secrets, a fight with her older and much more glamorous sister, the bitchy rival in the AV club and the cute boy also in the AV club... Standard fare for your typical YA novel, very deftly handled.

The book's weakness lies in its very-vanilla themes and storyline: nothing big is at stake, nobody is evil, no one's life is risked and very little happens in the climax. YA books these days tend to push the envelope when it comes to dark themes and high stakes - for example, Sarah Rees Brennan's "The Demon's Lexicon" is in a completely different league compared to this. Perhaps it's not always necessary to go dark and dangerous to be a good book, but the low conflict level in this one did detract from my ability to care what happens to Charlotte. I always knew she would be fine.

The book's strength is definitely in its solid narrative skills and likeable cast of characters. I can see why there will be two more books about Charlotte Silver. Recommended for younger teens. show less

Review for books 1 and 2 of the Past Midnight series

I've always been a fan of ghost stories, even when they terrified me to the point of huddling under the covers with only a tiny air hole open at top, so not even a ghostly breeze could touch me.*

Thing is, I've loved good spooky stories without being overly horrifying or gory, but sadly I haven't seen many good ones crop up in middle grade or young adult fiction over the past few years.

Enter Mara Purnhagen, who has written creepy ghost stories that make me want to burn the candles late into the night as I read, even with the possibility that I won't be able to sleep in a creaking house later. The premise struck me immediately—the daughter of ghost debunkers is followed home by the show more spooks that apparently don't exist—the writing and characterization are solid enough to provide a captivating story.

While her books will probably be classified as paranormal romance, I prefer to think of them as magical realism. These ghosts are the goosebumpily realistic kind that could potentially happen to anyone—if you believe in ghosts. Maybe even if you didn't.

Both books are good, solid stories, though I was more captivated by the first, Past Midnight. There is also a short story, Raising the Dead, touted book 1.5, that I've downloaded to my Kindle but still waits to be read.

Overall, I enjoy this series and look forward to Purnhagen's forthcoming titles.


*I haven't done that since I was a kid. Well, not really.

Thanks to Harlequin Teen for review copies of both books show less

"The truth is that the paranormal is normal. It's just a normal we don't understand yet."

This one was actually pretty good. I wasn't so sure. Paranormal investigators as parents can be an interesting story (or, if not done well, not a good story). This one was the good kind. I felt bad for Charlotte and her sister for how they grew up. Moving around and never staying anywhere long had to be tough. Add that they had to help their parents with jobs and technical equipment and it's suddenly a childhood I couldn't even imagine.

I liked how there were multiple stories going at once - and Charlotte was the middle crossing point that pulled it all together. I found most things interesting and realistic.

Charlotte’s parents have devoted their lives to debunking famous hauntings—they even have their own TV show dedicated to scientifically explaining “ghosts”. Charlotte has grown used to moving from place to place for her parents’ jobs, but deep down, she just wants to be normal. But Charlotte soon discover that she’s anything but normal—and her parents might not be entirely right about ghosts not being real.

Don’t let the synopsis fool you--Past Midnight may sound unimpressive, but it’s actually got quite a bit going for it. Mara Purnhagen creates an entirely new science for her novel—the science of ghosts. The way in which Charlotte’s parents explain “ghosts” is so well developed that it sounds legitimate. show more Purhagen expertly blends science (via Charlotte’s parents) and the supernatural to make the reader question whether or not ghosts really exist in Charlotte’s world. The story, too, is anything but tired: Purnhagen crafts a complex, suspenseful mystery that keeps you on your toes throughout the whole novel.

Charlotte, the protagonist, is a bit unmemorable, but she does have wit and intellect working in her favor. Thanks to her quick thinking, the reader doesn’t have to wait for pages and pages while she tries to puzzle together clues to the mystery. Charlotte figures things out fairly easily. One nitpicky thing about Charlotte, though, is that she didn’t quite seem to act her age. Her mentality and dialogue felt more suited to a 15-year-old than a senior in high school. Still, her immaturity doesn’t take away from the reading experience at all.

Past Midnight will definitely be enjoyed by fans of paranormal YA. It doesn’t have much of a romance (something extremely common in this genre), but it instead focuses on the relationships between family and friends. Those who tire of romance-centric paranormals will find Past Midnight refreshing, and mystery-loving readers will love piecing together the puzzle with Charlotte. show less

Ever since reading Mara Purhagen's fantastic first novel Tagged, I've been eager to read more by her, so when Past Midnight (her newest novel and a paranormal mystery at that!) showed up in my mailbox I was beyond ecstatic. And as it turned out that was just the right emotion to be feeling, because Past Midnight is an unputdownable ghostly paranormal read that I can't suggest highly enough for all you paranormal lovers out there!

From the first page the reader is thrown into the world of Charlotte Silver, a girl who has never been exactly normal thanks to her famous paranormal investigator parents. But this year, Charlotte's senior year, is going to be different; she's going to be normal. Because not only have her parents agreed to stay show more in one place for the year but she's already making friends at her new school. But as it turns out everything is soon to unravel. Because not only is she being stalked by scary paranormal beings, but her friends are getting closer and closer to finding out about Charlotte's parents occupation and she just can't have that now, can she? So now she's on the path to find out who (or perhaps what) is stalking her and how she can get rid of them once for all, but when her friends find out about everything, will they stick by her side? More importantly: will she make it out of high school alive? And most important of all: Will she EVER be normal? Only time can tell in this rich paranormal mystery by Ms. Purhagen.

Charlotte was a character I loved reading about, because, quite frankly, she was a pretty interesting girl. I especially loved the way she would go out of her to help her new friends, and the way she grew to understand that no one is normal or perfect for the matter, that you should just roll with the punches and live your life. My favorite secondary character out of the mix would have to be a tie between Avery and Noah, because both were characters that were not only fun to read about but ones I respected as well.

The plot of this was nothing short of fun, though why wouldn't it be? I loved the way Mara intertwined facts about paranormal investigating right along with the ghostly sub-plot, because paranormal investigating is a topic I always love to read more about. Making Past Midnight even better in my eyes was Mara's writing, which moved in a fun, fast paced sort of way, just like in Tagged.

In all, Past Midnight is a ghostly paranormal mystery and a fantastic start to a new series that I highly suggest you pick up the next time you see it in stores or online.

Grade: A- show less