The Midnight Lie

Book Title: The Midnight Lie

Author: Marie Rutkoski

Series: The Midnight Lie #1

Date Started: January 16th 2020

Date Completed: February 6th 2020

Genres: Fantasy, Romance, Mystery

Quality Rating: Two Stars

Enjoyment Rating: Two Stars

Final Rating: Two Stars

Review:

◆ Thanks to NetGalley for this eBook copy for review ◆

A few years ago I was persuaded to read The Winner’s Curse by Marie Rutkoski. I thought it would be too much of a romance for my tastes, but I was pleasantly surprised to find it complex, political, nuanced and exciting. When The Midnight Lie came up, I was prepared to be blown away once again. Sadly, this book turned out to be everything I had wrongly assumed the first time round, only this time my expectations were pretty high.

I had two main problems for enjoying this book. The first was that I couldn’t get behind the main character, Nirrim. As a Half-Kith, a ‘lesser’ citizen preyed upon by law enforcement and just about everyone above her, she’s been brainwashed into thinking she’s inferior. Or at least when it serves the plot. The problem is then that she comes across so stupid and/or hopeless that it’s dull. Subsequently, everyone referring to her like she’s clever drags things into unbelievable territory.

My second reservation is the representation of the lesbian (bisexual?) relationship. It begins with us being persuaded that the love interest is a man because Nirrim’s eye-sight and hearing is conveniently easily-led (some girls can seem ‘masculine’, that’s fine, but for the rest of the book she’s pretty feminised in everything apart from clothes – and I suppose the fact that she’s a lesbian (but associating that with masculinity is already problematic). There’s a part where Sid is described offering Nirrim her arm ‘like a man would,’ and when I read that it immediately crystallised what I didn’t like: it really felt like all that had been done was change the gender of one of the characters. But sexuality is so much deeper than that (and gender is likewise, women aren’t just ‘like’ men or women), especially in a society that shuns non-heteronormative orientations.

The plot itself is actually pretty slow; there are these massive stakes but it never actually feels massive. It’s too familiar, it’s too predictable (painfully so), and there’s way too much talking for us to feel the urgency of the moment anyway. Nothing really happens. I don’t really know what the story was supposed to be. A love story? Well, that already rings false. A dystopian class drama? There isn’t enough attention paid to Nirrim’s character traits in that case (she has no problem frivolously throwing a very expensive item into a bet, and she doesn’t seem that offended by Sid’s honestly superficial approach to things). A mystery about where magic comes from in this world? That’s basically never in the forefront so I’d call it a cheap option. But turns out that’s actually what it is.

The key fantastical element that allows Nirrim to succeed (something about Nirrim having an over-active imagination? Magic blood? Mind control?! I’m still unclear) is mentioned at the beginning and then disappears for 300 odd pages and comes into play right at the end. And what a strange ending it is. So off-beat, different from everything up until then, but unfortunately not at all satisfying. There was me criticising the romance for being too important to the story, and then the finale has literally nothing to do with any of it. (Top tip to publishers (ft. SPOILER), maybe selling something on the LGBT element isn’t a great idea when the relationship doesn’t actually last).