The Mirk and Midnight Hour

Gr 7 Up—Violet's life is already in turmoil after her brother dies fighting for the South in the War Between the States, but now things have been completely upended: two distant cousins are coming to stay for the summer, and her father has remarried, bringing his new wife and her daughter into their home, then leaving for the war himself. But when Violet and her younger cousin discover Thomas, a wounded Union soldier holed up in a ruin deep in the woods, things become really complicated. Nickerson retold the Bluebeard story in Strands of Bronze and Gold (Knopf, 2013), and here she recrafts the ballad of Tam Lin, setting it in Mississippi during the Civil War. Her tale is strikingly atmospheric: Violet's summer feels languid and sticky with brief moments of lightness and respite during her visits to Thomas (with whom she is falling in love despite herself). Through it all, a thrumming drumbeat of danger grows louder until reaching the wild conclusion. But while Nickerson makes the most of the setting with the book's mood, it's also her story's Achilles heel. The treatment of race is problematic: Violet's family's slave, Laney, is referred to as a "servant" and promises she won't leave, since her family and Violet's are linked. The villains are also the shadowy VanZeldts, who practice a mix of hoodoo and snake worship they learned in Africa. Fans of Nancy Werlin's Impossible (Dial, 2008), dark faeries, magical realism, historical fantasy, and star-crossed love will find plenty to enjoy here.—Gretchen Kolderup, New York Public Library