Nox Winters and the Midnight Wolf

July 8, 2024
Twelve-year-old identical twin brothers Nox and Noah Winters had never been apart, until Noah was sent to live with their mother’s oncologist friends Weston and Aster Day to treat his mysterious worsening condition, the symptoms of which includes spreading rashes and sores. Soon, however, Nox joins Noah at his dwellings in “middle-of-nowhere” Evergreen, Maine, where Nox chafes at his new environment, worries about his brother, and distrusts the Days, especially their daughter Thea. But when he catches a glowing, six-eyed, wolf-like creature stalking Noah at night and stealing something “golden and bright” from his chest—and Noah falls into a coma thereafter—Nox reluctantly enlists Thea as his companion in investigating. Together, they enter the otherworldly, eternally dark Nightwood, hoping it contains the secret to saving Noah. As they brave Nightwood’s many dangers, the duo unravels family secrets and realizes not all is as it seems. In this creepy duology opener, Hassan (The Summer Queen) unspools a spine-tingling tale packed with riddles, magic, and mystery in which the brothers’ fierce bond grounds the more fantastical elements of the Nightwood’s original and evocative mythology. Main characters read as white. Ages 8–up. Agent: Erica Bauman, Aevitas Creative.

Starred review from July 15, 2024
After several terrible months apart, Nox Winters and his identical twin brother, Noah, are finally together in Evergreen, Maine, where Noah is receiving treatment for a mysterious illness. The seventh graders are staying in the unsettling house of their mother's friends Weston and Aster Day, who are oncologists. Noah, Nox's charming, easygoing opposite, is getting worse, a setback that's tied to a spectral wolf who enters through their window at night. Joined by levelheaded, nature-loving Thea, Aster's daughter, Nox ventures into the local forest seeking answers in the Nightwood, a parallel world of eternal darkness. Hassan's duology opener is a classic quest story that lies on the border between horror and the fantastic. The Nightwood is populated by creatures from mythology and nightmare: animalistic forest deities, living constellations, and a terrifying yet endearing puppet. The story moves at an assured clip as Nox and Thea use practicality to survive a world they can no longer fully understand. Nox is clever and loyal, but he's heroic out of necessity rather than inclination. He's propelled by a temper that's a genuine struggle for him, making his life and relationships difficult to manage. As the true nature of Noah's condition and the secrets of the twins' history unfurl, so do Nox's first forays into trusting people outside his family and accepting his own flaws and mistakes. The central cast presents white. An enjoyably strange and wildly inventive journey into the unknown.(Fantasy. 8-12)

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September 15, 2024
Grades 5-8 Nox won't be apart from his twin, Noah, because then he can't help Noah fight the illness eating him alive. Their prior separation threw Nox into fits of rage at school, getting him expelled for beating up bullies. When Nox joins Noah at a cabin in Maine's northern woods, he catches an eerie presence, like the ghost of a wolf, creeping through the window after midnight and hovering over Noah. Fearing it's the cause of Noah's suffering, Nox vows to destroy the wolf and one night follows it deep into the woods. He discovers that the wolf comes from a world of eternal night that many beings call home--a home, Nox learns, that was once his and his brother's, a place where his anger has power. Hassan paints a beautifully dark world with truly haunting details; sensitive readers beware. While the prose is enchanting and the mystery absorbing, the resolution for Nox is a little tidy, somewhat undermining his struggle with anger. Still, fans of darker themes will find much to enjoy here.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.