The Midnight News
by Jo Baker
16 January 2025
I started reading this before Christmas and the beginning was a little intriguing but rather slow going and I put the book down for a few weeks. The library renewal came round and I almost took it back in but decided I’d enjoyed the books of Jo Baker’s I’d read in the past enough that I’d give it another go.
I’m really glad I gave it a second chance. The slow start feels like it was necessary in order for the rest of the book to work. We meet Charlotte, twenty years old and trying to make her own way in life away from her overbearing father, I think he was a baronet or some such. It’s 1940 and the Blitz is on in London, I grew up with Second World War stories and definitely have a soft spot for them. There’s a lot that’s familiar here but also tons of little details that feel right, the author has clearly done her research as well as drawing on popular culture. I have read too many books with dodgy anachronistic trivia in them and it was pleasant to feel like this one was pretty much correct.
The story is woven very well, those details mean that the important threads are blended in with the background. It’s only looking back over the book as things fall into place that you realise you already know what’s happening. It’s not a mystery but it feels like one for a bit and I enjoyed that.
That the slow start left me wondering whether to continue is my only real criticism of the book, and perhaps that was just me being a little stressed rather than the book’s problem. I’m very pleased I kept going as the latter half of the book is a real gem.
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