Midnight Robber

By: Nalo Hopkinson

Narrated by: Robin Miles

Earphones Award Winner (AudioFile Magazine)

It's Carnival time and the Caribbean-colonized planet of Toussaint is celebrating with music, dance, and pageantry. Masked "Midnight Robbers" waylay revelers with brandished weapons and spellbinding words. To young Tan-Tan, the Robber Queen is simply a favorite costume to wear at the festival - until her power-corrupted father commits an unforgiveable crime.

Suddenly, both father and daughter are thrust into the brutal world of New Half-Way Tree. Here monstrous creatures from folklore are real, and the humans are violent outcasts in the wilds. Tan-Tan must reach into the heart of myth and become the Robber Queen herself. For only the Robber Queen's legendary powers can save her life...and set her free.

©2000 Nalo Hopkinson (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Robin Miles's voice is deep, rich, and rolling. The story is written in a kind of patois, and her narration makes it easy to understand—probably easier than reading it in print. She effortlessly creates unique characters—whether male, female, young, old, sentient birds, ghosts, or aliens." (AudioFile)

Life Renewed

The story is Nalo Hopkinson's best. i like how it brings together all cultures of the Caribbean and its African roots, and its African-American antecedents, how it takes the story of yet another male folkloric figure and feminizes it, giving the woman voice, empowering her to rescue herself from invisibility and anonymity, and how it turns death into life renewed. I like the performance of the reader because it brings the characters alive, representing their uniqueness, and staying true to their Caribbean accents, languages, and culture. I would, however, have liked her to sing those little folkloric ditties so well-known to everyone who has grown up in a Caribbean space.

Bleak and Bright

I was riveted. Robin Miles was amazing. The story was brutal and bright. Fantastic performance!!

Even Through the Dimensions, Girls Are Not Safe

Robin Miles narrates Midnight Robber with a strong patois that was initially a turnoff for me. It was like listening to narration in a foreign language. The story itself is an unusual mix of old and sci-fi, there are 'aware' buildings with artificial intelligence the characters interact with and devices like toilets that measure one's physical health. There are also 'duels' with machetes and a lot of rank poverty. It reminds me of Firefly, with its combination of space ships and people riding horses. I believe the narrator's patois is of Haitian derivation, lots of 'oui's' and I definitely learned to love it. I found it musical and mesmerizing when all was said and done, DoDo. I listened to the novel at least three times and found things I missed in each subsequent listening. I grew to love Tan Tan, the main character in the novel. We meet Tan Tan when she is about 7, and lord, does this child have trials and tribulations to endure! In the end endure she does. I felt the story was also a reflection of the treatment of native, indigenous peoples. I find Nalo Hopkinson an engaging artist, introducing characters of locales of interest. I found the primary story line sad, however. Even into the future, across dimensions, girls are not safe. Despite that, I gave the novel top ratings across the board. I will read Nalo Hopkinson again. I actually think there is a good possibility of a sequel to Midnight Robber. I want to know what happened to Iony, Melon Head, Chichibaud, Tifa and other characters it would be a spoiler to mention here. I recommend the book, it is very good and I'll probably listen to it a fourth time. That's one of the things I love about audio books, you can always invest in another reading!

Took a while to get into, but worth the effort

I restarted this book 5-6 times, before I was accustomed enough to the patois to focus on the story. I’m so happy that I persevered.

It is a hard story in parts (trigger warning for child abuse), taking place in an wonderful Caribbean-centric sci-if world. Taking an abrupt, fantastical turn. The protagonist has a difficult, often heartbreaking journey of self-discovery. But the payoff feels earned. Loved the focus on folktales, and the power of storytelling.

High recommendation, I will be seeking out more work by this author.

Amazing performance made much of this story sing

I really enjoyed this story more than I expected, and I suspect that I will 1) be listening to it again, and 2) love it more with each reading/listening experience. The main reason I didn't give it five stars is that I don't think I fully appreciated this book on my first pass and probably need to read it at least once more. First, for those who are concerned, content and trigger warnings include sexual assault, pedophilia, incest, domestic abuse, psychological trauma, split personality, violence, and murder.

With that out of the way, there were many things I loved about this book. The author expertly weaves Caribbean folklore and culture in a utopian/dystopian (depending on which side you are on) futuristic world. This book felt like fantasy, mythology, science fiction, survival, and adventure all rolled into one. It was also a coming-of-age story about Tan-Tan and what she does to survive and figure out who she is. The tale is told in what I believe is a Caribean dialect, which is one of the main reasons I decided to listen to the story. Robin Miles narrates the story, and as brutal as some of it was, she made it a joy for me to listen to this book. I originally intended to read along with the narration, but only one of my libraries had a copy, but it had a long waiting list. As it turns out, I didn't really need to read along, although I might try doing that in subsequent readings of this book. It took some concentration in some places, but the language is pretty logical and Robin Miles made it pretty easy for me to follow the story. In some ways, it reminded me of Clockwork Orange because of the unique language and the controlled society, as well as some of the violence. However, Midnight Robber is not nearly as violent and Tan-Tan is a very sympathetic character for all that she speaks about a good Tan-Tan and a bad Tan-Tan.

If you enjoy classic sci-fi, rich world-building, fantastical creatures, and interesting characters, and you can deal with the trigger warnings above, then give this book a try and for the more adventurous of you, listen to Robin Miles' excellent narration.