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Summary: A boy who loves to read
Review: This book is a great read. Although it may look long it's a quick read and once you're through it you'll wish there was more. This book encorporates just the right mix of suspense, action, mystery, fantasy, and creepiness. Nimmo really can write some great stuff. One of the best book I've read! Some may say it's a rip off of Harry Potter. It's not! It is actually extremely different! So go get one of theese books today! You'll be begging for more but you'll just have to wait untill September.
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Summary: Where is the second? I want it now!
Review: I am so glad I read this book! I got set in a trance after reading the first page. I read it in two days, that is how good it is. Jenny Nimmo got me so involved in the story that i got angry when Charlie was angry or the same with sad or excited. Now i have to wait until September for the second. That is a long time to wait for a good book.
Charlie is one of the endowed, which means he must attend Bloor's Academy. He is searching for a lost baby, but where could it be?
I am sad i finished it now, but i am passing it around to my friends! PICK UP THE BOOK NOW!
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Summary: Rip off of Harry Potter?
Review: At first when I read this book I thought that Nimmo ripped off Harry Potter but as I read along, I noticed that this book was good on its own.Granted its not the best, the story doesn't fail to entertain. I look forward to the second novel.
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Summary: Fun Book for Fantasy lovers
Review: Great and original fun. While it has some similarities to the Harry Potter series, in many ways it is more original. I am 48 years old and the last few years I have read a few of the fantasy series for older children and I find that they are producing better, more interesting, more original, and certainly funner reads than those penned for adults. I look forward to the future work of this talented writer.
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Summary: A Harry Potter Wannabee
Review: This book was most intriguing, and quite thrilling but if you've red the Harry Potter series, this book is very predictable and not very understandable. Also, for those Harry Potter fans this book might become a bit dull because it's got the same theme. A sort of wannabe. However, if you have not read JK Rowling's work, this book is a thriller!
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Summary: An exceedingly good book.
Review: This book was great. I have read it so many times! This book is all about Charlie who lives with his mum, two grandmothers, and his uncle. He ends up having to go to the dreadful Bloor's Academy, and he finds friends and actually has a nice time. He is able to save a girl, trapped, by an evil man, and they become good friends. (Which helps out in the next book believe me. Without her and all his other friends he would have been toast against Skarpo.) This book is ridiculously good and I would recommend it to anyone who wants to read a good book.
And you'd better read the next one too!
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Summary: ALMOST as good as Harry Potter.
Review: This is one of the best books I have ever heard. It helped me pass the time before OOTP. I can't wait for the sequel. MFCB starts out and then you find out later in the book how Charlie is connected. I hope you will take this review into thought and get the book from the library or buy it if your parents will.
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Summary: Better than most... could do better
Review: I practically read books to children for a living, so finding a new one that I can enjoy is exciting. This story of Charlie Bone and his odd relatives was fun and for the most part original. The one thing that I take issue with is the sprinkling of Harry Potter names and situations that were honestly unnecessary. I was interested in Charlie and his buddies, but seeing references to a "red haired, weasely boy" and seeing "Pettigrew" snuck in on a minor character's name made me cringe. I wanted to call the author and tell her that she can do this on her own.... leave Harry out of it!!! She shows too much promise with her own take on a boarding school containing children with magic powers.... um, well she DOES make most of it interesting and different, believe it or not. Let's just say that I liked it enough to let my son read it and consider buying the next one for him and my class. I just hope she can leave Hogwarts out of it from now on, but with the time turning theme set up for the next book, I have some doubts. Regardless, it's a fun read for the family. Give it a shot.
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Summary: Midnight for Charlie Bone
Review: When I first saw this book, sitting in my local Borders bookstore on the "bestsellers" shelf, it made me curious. There was only one copy left, and it was a bestseller, but how come nobody would buy it? I go to Borders a lot, and every time I went there for the next week or so, the same copy of "Midnight for Charlie Bone" was sitting in the same exact spot untouched. I kept looking at it, flipping through the pages and inspecting the cover. I wanted to read it, but what frightened me so much was that the text inside was sort of big like in a kid's book, and, even though it still had a lot of pages, I thought it might be strange if I read it, like it was too juvenile for me. One day after my birthday, when I had some birthday money left to spend, I finally gathered enough courage to buy it. Wow, was I surprised when I read it! It was one of the best books I had ever read, and I was even more excited when I learned that it was just the beginning of a series. Every night during spring break, I would sit outide on my back porch with my copy of "Midnight for Charlie Bone" open in my lap, enjoying every word I read. I have to admit, some of it did seem childish to me at first, but I kept on reading and it got better and better and I didn't even worry about that anymore. There is so much mystery and magic inside this book that anybody who reads it will be hooked from the very first chapter, no matter who you are. It was hard for me to summarize how this book appealed to me, but I finally decided that it was kind of like a new sort of Harry Potter with an original twist to it. The ending of the book is kind of left open and there are many questions asked that are still yet to be answered, which is good because it means that the other books in the series will be involved with some of the same things and will be just as good! I would recommend "Midnight for Charlie Bone" to anyone, especially those who like fantasy and mystery or those who are searching for something to read while waiting for the next Harry Potter book to arrive. I can't wait for the second installment in this series (The Children of the Red King series, it's called) to come out in the U.S. It's name is "Time Twister", and, by the looks of it, it will be as good as the first!
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Summary: Fairly good
Review: Budding-wizard-goes-to-school books are becoming increasingly common now that the initial buzz over the Harry Potter series has passed. But more of these are good than you'd think. "Midnight for Charlie Bone," while not the best, is certainly entertaining. Charlie Bone and his widowed mother live more or less under the thumbs of his horrible grandmother -- until the day he starts hearing photographs speaking. His horrible great-aunts are elated. It turns out that Charlie is one of the "children of the Red King," and so has a specific magical talent. Because his mother was not magical and his father was, they weren't sure if he would be, and now they know. Though Charlie doesn't want to go, he is quickly enrolled in Bloor's Academy for gifted children. A man with three unusually intelligent cats is lurking around the place, his uncle Paton is stirred from his lethargy, and Charlie begins to learn about a missing child from many years before. A child that, for some reason, someone doesn't want him to find... Jenny Nimmo's book isn't outstanding, but it is quite nice. While the ending wraps up this particular story, it's clear that there are sequels in mind. With a combination of ordinary and "endowed" people, and a sprinkling of unique talents (one boy can sense the previous owners of clothing), this can stand on its own with no comparisons to Harry Potter. This one is a little darker, a little weirder. The concept of the Red King is an interesting one, especially the slightly dark tone of the good and bad "endowed" people's responses to one another. The particular quirks, like the intelligent cats, the flashbacks, and the material about Charlie's may-not-be-dead father are also quite good. Her writing style is a little too spare, not giving much detail, and the handling of the "endowed" school is rather unassuming. Charlie himself is a likable character, as is his timid pal Benjamin. The sinister grandmother and great-aunts aren't quite as well-fleshed out, and his schoolmates have potential but aren't quite there yet. (I guess we'll have to wait for the sequels) Uncle Paton is one of the standouts, a moody and introverted guy who causes lightbulbs and windows to explode. "Midnight for Charlie Bone" isn't quite as good as the Magickers or Chrestomanci series, but it is a solid read that kids may enjoy. Not bad at all.
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