Midnight Strikes, Zeba Shahnaz
Midnight Strikes, Zeba Shahnaz
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Midnight Strikes

Author: Zeba Shahnaz

Narrator: Nikki Massoud

Unabridged: 11 hr 58 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 03/14/2023


Synopsis

In this explosive fantasy debut, a provincial girl must work with an infuriatingly handsome prince to escape a nightmarish curse that forces them to relive the same night over and over.

"The time-loop fantasy you never knew you needed, where the fairytale ball is bloody and Cinderella is the Final Girl."—Gina Chen, New York Times bestselling author of Violet Made of Thorns

Seventeen-year-old Anaïs just wants tonight to end. As an outsider at the kingdom’s glittering anniversary ball, she has no desire to rub shoulders with the nation’s most eligible (and pompous) bachelors—especially not the notoriously roguish Prince Leo. But at the stroke of midnight, an explosion rips through the palace, killing everyone in its path. Including her.

The last thing Anaïs sees is fire, smoke, chaos . . . and then she wakes up in her bedroom, hours before the ball. No one else remembers the deadly attack or believes her warnings of disaster.

Not even when it happens again. And again. And again.

If she’s going to escape this nightmarish time loop, Anaïs must take control of her own fate and stop the attack before it happens. But the court's gilded surface belies a rotten core, full of restless nobles grabbing at power, discontented commoners itching for revolution, and even royals who secretly dream of taking the throne. It's up to Anaïs to untangle these knots of deadly deceptions . . . if she can survive past midnight.

About The Author

Zeba Shahnaz writes fantasy full of political intrigue, twisted romance, and a healthy dose of existential angst. A proud Pakistani American, she translated her love of storytelling into a graduate degree analyzing national identity, culture, and cinema in South Asia. She grew up in New Jersey, which she has yet to fully escape (though not because of a time loop). Midnight Strikes is her debut novel.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Aine on July 28, 2022

~Contains some spoilers~ Overall, this was not a bad book, I do want to preface that I am not normally a fan of time-loop storylines, so I am trying not to judge the book unfairly in that aspect. That being said, I felt that the book was a little too long. Indeed, what Anaïs accomplished by the end o......more

Goodreads review by Fifi’s Bookshelf on May 03, 2023

This book is like Happy Death Day mixed with Cinderella and I never thought I’d say those two things in the same sentence. Fairytales are my favorite genre. Time loops are fun. But a time loop plot WITHIN the fairytale genre is a rarity! This is like Cinderella on steroids. It has all the elements o......more

Goodreads review by Jordan on March 14, 2023

While I liked the premise of Midnight Strikes, the execution fell short for me. The time loop aspect is always fun, but Anaïs only has a few hours before she's killed and the loop resets, so she never really has enough time to learn much. As a result, she lives through the loop a. ton. of. times. and......more

Goodreads review by Sarah on April 29, 2023

This book is what would happen if Cinderella and Sci-fi had a baby. Anaïs is ready to go home. She is tired of trying to marry above her station, despite her parent's attempts to help her find a suitable husband. With one more ball to go, Anaïs is ready to call it quits when, all of a sudden, she di......more

Goodreads review by Tory on March 11, 2023

[ARC] I liked the time loop at first but then it went on WAYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY too long. By the time we got to actually solving the loop, I'd fully stopped caring. "Love" with Leo was weak and undeveloped. Not nearly enough "royals treating commoners like shit" to justify the rebellion.......more


Quotes

Midnight Strikes is pure, high-octane fun. With whip-smart worldbuilding, spectacular twists, and the angsty romance of my dreams, Shahnaz’s debut is guaranteed to keep you up reading until midnight. A masterclass in YA fantasy.”—Allison Saft, New York Times bestselling author of Down Comes the Night and A Far Wilder Magic

"Intricate and swoony, Midnight Strikes is the time-loop fantasy you never knew you needed, where the fairytale ball is bloody and Cinderella is the Final Girl. I'd gladly follow Anaïs until the end of time."—Gina Chen, New York Times bestselling author of Violet Made of Thorns

"A twisty, glittering and breathtaking fantasy romance that will ensnare you and refuse to let you go."—Tasha Suri, author of The Jasmine Throne

"Shahnaz’s gripping debut is a twisty story...slowly unveiling a plot full of courtly intrigue with a determined lead character whose personal agency is the focus. Riveting, time-looping fun."—Kirkus Reviews

"Anaïs’s profound feelings of isolation and loneliness, and her repeated deaths, including her subsequent grief and trauma following each, are handled with complexity and gravitas alongside discussions of intersectionality in this elaborate debut."—Publishers Weekly

“…Anaïs is a heroine well worth rooting for: resourceful, clever, and rarely one to indulge in self-pity, she enters each night with a gritty determination to stop the violence and put things right.” —The Bulletin

"Shahnaz has created an entire world of rich cultures and history....A perfect choice for fans of second chances, also third, fourth, etc." —School Library Journal