‘Round Midnight by Laura McBride
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Actual Rating: 4.0
This was one of the most unique books I’ve ever read, in terms of style. ‘Round Midnight follows the lives of four women, who lead very different lives over the span of sixty years. There’s June, who falls in love – not with the wrong person, but during the wrong time. There’s Honorata, who is forced to leave her homeland to marry, but fortunately gets lucky and wins the jackpot; for the first time, she can do things on her own. There’s Engracia, who unluckily gets her heart broken. And there’s Coral, who doesn’t know anything about her own past, but one day hopes she finally will.
This story was absolutely beautiful. I’m usually not one for historical fiction, but the setting was described very powerfully, which really added to an atmosphere of nostalgia the book had; there was a meshing of different cultures during an older time period that both made me realize how far we’d come as a society, but also reminded me that there was so much more to do.
Now, I’m typically not one for multiple perspectives either, but one very unique thing about this book is that it focuses more on the stories than on the characters, and though each woman had their own journey, it all came together. I wasn’t that into Engracia’s story (hence my four star), and Honorata’s story was perhaps my favorite, but of course none of the stories would be the same if not for the others.
The writing style was, without a doubt, beautiful. Overall, this was a very compelling novel; hopeful and tragic, it might be one of my favorites of 2017 so far.
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