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ABOUT THE BOOK
The award-winning author of The Haunting of Maddy Clare and Silence for the Dead, presents another mesmerizing gothic story of intrigue... London, 1925. Glamorous medium Gloria Sutter made her fortune helping the bereaved contact loved ones killed during the Great War. Now she's been murdered at one of her own séances, after leaving a message requesting the help of her former friend and sole rival, Ellie Winter. Ellie doesn't contact the dead—at least, not anymore. She specializes in miraculously finding lost items. Still, she can't refuse the final request of the only other true psychic she has known.
Now Ellie must delve into Gloria's secrets and plunge back into the world of hucksters, lowlifes, and fakes. Worse, she cannot shake the attentions of handsome James Hawley, a damaged war veteran who has dedicated himself to debunking psychics. As Ellie and James uncover the sinister mysteries of Gloria's life and death, Ellie is tormented by nightmarish visions that herald the grisly murders of those in Gloria's circle. And as Ellie’s uneasy partnership with James turns dangerously intimate, an insidious evil force begins to undermine their quest for clues, a force determined to bury the truth, and whoever seeks to expose it...
Opening Lines
“The man who sat before me at seven o’clock on a Tuesday evening was lying.”
GUEST REVIEW by Sophia Rose
One night a young psychic’s life is overturned when a message from beyond is placed in her hands. And just like that, I was eager to slip into another Simone St. James novel with a mysterious and ghostly tale woven with romance and danger.
Post-WWI London and the Roaring Twenties is the backdrop for talented psychic, Ellie Winters, as she investigates the murder of a rival who had once been a friend. Ellie is the sole narrator, telling the story through flashbacks of her first encounters with the victim as well as more recent reflections of the glamorous Gloria.
Ellie sees herself as average, but she’s a strong female protagonist who faces opposition. After all, she’s a single woman with a dubious career; she sees the dead. And she’s lost everyone she's ever cared about. Or is someone in her corner she's not expecting?
I appreciated how the horrors of war and the struggles soldiers faced afterward were incorporated into the story, especially through Ellie’s love interest, the psychic investigator, James. The séances and psychic world of the time lend fascinating world building as Ellie, with James’s assistance, attempts to solve the murder.
What fun to find a familiar Scotland Yard detective (from An Inquiry into Love and Death) in an active investigation, as well as get an update on his love life.
Narrator Billie Fulford-Brown is a new-to-me narrator. Her interpretation of the characters, particularly Ellie, added to the atmosphere.
The slow build ratchets up the tension until the exciting reveal. One psychic on a quest to solve the murder of another psychic against a well-drawn historical backdrop, The Other Side of Midnight is a winner, especially for those who enjoy a blend of historical, paranormal, and romantic suspense.
The Other Side of Midnight by Simone St. James
Narrator: Billie Fulford-Brown
Historical Romantic Suspense
Publisher: Penguin Audio
Published: 11.14.23
Time: 10 hours 24 minutes
Rating: 4.5 stars
Narrator Rating: 5 stars
Format: Audio
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Simone St. James is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of The Book of Old Cases, The Sundown Motel, and The Broken Girls. After years of writing and collecting rejections, Simone’s debut novel, The Haunting of Maddy Clare, won two RITA Awards from Romance Writers of America and an Arthur Ellis Award from Crime Writers of Canada. An Inquiry into Love and Death was nominated for another Arthur Ellis Award. Simone spent twenty years behind the scenes in the television business before leaving to write full-time. She lives just outside Toronto, Canada, with her husband and a spoiled rescue cat. She is addicted to sushi, rainy days, coffee, and My Favorite Murder. Connect with Simone via her website.
ABOUT THE GUEST REVIEWER
Sophia Rose is a quiet though curious gal who dabbles in cooking, book reviewing, piano-playing, and gardening. Road trips and campouts, museums and monuments, restaurants and theaters are her jam. Encouraged and supported by an incredible man and loving family. A Northern Californian transplant to the Great Lakes region of the US. Lover of Jane Austen, baseball, cats, Scooby Doo, and chocolate.
As a lifelong reader, it was inevitable that Sophia would discover book blogs and the joy of blog reviewing. In 2012, she submitted her first book review and is currently an associate reviewer.
Sophia is a prolific reader and audiobook listener which allows her to experience many wonderful books, authors, and narrators. Few genres are outside her reading tastes, but her true love is fiction particularly history, mystery, sci-fi, and romance. Sorry, no horror...or she will run like Shaggy and Scooby.
