Malcolm at Midnight
By: W. H. Beck / Narrated By: Charlotte Parry
Length: 5 hrs and 59 mins
A tale sweet enough that I, uhm, alREADY got the sequel?
I was very much rooting for y’all to vote in Malcolm at Midnight for my Next Listen, and huzzah! Y’all granted my dearest wish!
While I was a tad disappointed that the book is most DEFinitely geared to younger readers who might have difficulties with more serious content, I dug deep ‘round inside myself to yank out my Inner Child. So, whereas the grownup that I am may’ve been a tad bored, that ol’ Inner Child was delighted.
Malcolm is a, don’t say it! Rat! One who is mistaken for a mouse, and as he’s being invited on a trial basis to join the Midnight Academy (The school’s classroom pets who come together to make sure the kids are safe), he’s very sure to keep mum about his Rat status. The words Rat Fink keep getting bandied around, and every time someone talks about how ratty rats are and they can’t be trusted? Well, his heart sinks a bit each time.
So when Aggy the Iguana, leader of the Academy, goes missing, Malcolm comes under suspicion, and it’s up to him to solve the mystery and clear his name. He’s broken an Academy rule by revealing his intelligence to one of the students in Room 11, Amelia, but he doesn't care as she’s the only friend he’s got at this point. The two, rat and student, set off to find clues, decipher meanings, make plans. They swipe cell phones and make calls, only to discover even more mysterious circumstances.
Sometimes things aren’t explained too well; when we get to the Evil on the Fourth Floor, things move along so briskly and are resolved so swiftly that one is left with a decided: Huh? running through ones head. But again: Younger readers aren’t into logic and details, things I was yammering for as I listened to that particular couple of short chapters.
Then too Charlotte Parry’s narration is that of a youngster (Except for some Audio fixes where she sounds like an old lady… very odd) telling the 5th grade teacher of Malcolm’s adventures and of how things wound up the way they did. Parry can’t really do much of a male’s voice (The 5th grade teacher namely), and her voices for the bad guys (Bad bunny? Bad cat?) come off as hyper sly, harsh and judgmental. But all in all, she managed to convey each character well.
And seriously, by the end I was so engaged that I got the sequel as it was on sale at the Kindle store. I HAD to get it as, really! There’s a great opportunity for Cat Redemption (Our villain of the story is, of course, a cat! called Snip. But she does a lot of baaaad things, her soul neeeds to be redeemed!). Naturally, my favorite part of the book was when we get to Snip’s story and to why she does the evil things she does. It’s her wicked plot, after all, that has to be foiled by the entire Academy at the end.
The story has a lot of really nice things for younger listeners (Especially when Malcolm decides that he’s just gonna be the Rat He Is, true to himself, proud of himself), plus there are a few vocabulary words chucked in there that might broaden a kid’s horizons. AND there’s the Midnight Academy: Anybody who has memories of classroom pets is sure to beam a wide smile, remembering those critters and imagining what all they might get up to when nobody’s around and the clock strikes midnight.
Midnight is when a critter’s true character shows up, and Malcolm at Midnight shows a young rat, one who pulls his whiskers out in fits of nervousness, who is a critter of merit and of valor.
And I’ll let ya know how Malcolm Under the Stars goes. I don’t think I’ll risk it to a Tell Me What’s Next vote; I think I’m just gonna dive right in!
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