The Adventures of Midnight Son [Hardcover]

Denise Lewis Patrick (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 15, 1997 | Age Level: 8 and up

"There ain't no words right enough to explain feelin' free."

On a dark Texas night in 1863 Midnight Son escapes from the plantation where he has lived all his life. In constant fear of bounty hunters, he hides in trees during the day and travels by night until he makes it across the border into Mexico.

Free from slavery, Midnight finds work as a ranch hand and soon learns the ropes of a cowpoke. But as exciting as the job is, Midnight must face life-threatening situations everyday--like leading a team through a twister--in order to protect his herd.

Denise Lewis Patrick explores the physical and emotional experiences of a young cowboy who is coming to grips with his past, learning to accept the racial tensions around him, and ultimately embracing the goodness he has found in others.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 4-8. Despite a few flaws, notably a climactic scene featuring both a stampede and a tornado, this title is an example of convincing and compelling historical fiction. Midnight is the 13-year-old son of Texas slaves, suddenly free when his father engineers his escape during the confusion surrounding Texas's entry into the Civil War. The boy makes it to Mexico, where slavery is illegal, and where he is welcomed at a remote hacienda. There he learns the basics of the cowboy trade. When Slim, an older black man, leaves to join a cattle drive from Texas to Kansas, Midnight joins him. On the journey, he proves himself as a wrangler and trustworthy employee and also learns that not all men judge one another by their skin color. Patrick creates an interesting and unusual novel, told in a mostly winning colloquial voice. In addition to being a first-rate story, the book features well-rounded characters?black, white, and brown?and should also be useful for studies of African-American history, the Civil War, and Texas and frontier history. Leaner and a bit easier to read than the fine historical novels by G. Clifton Wisler and John Loveday's Goodbye, Buffalo Sky (McElderry, 1997), Midnight Son is also an excellent choice for the reluctantly literary.?Coop Renner, Coldwell Elementary-Intermediate School, El Paso, TX
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Kirkus Reviews

Patrick (The Car Washing Street, 1993, etc.) delivers an unusual cowboy adventure tale, told through the eyes of a runaway slave, Midnight Son, 13. Leaving Texas behind on a stolen horse, Midnight makes for the Mexican border by the light of the moon. In an early, outstanding scene, Midnight is caught and crated up by the plantation owner's son, with only the surreptitious, timely nods of a fellow slave to aid in his daring re-escape. Midnight begins his first hours of freedom just over the border, where he experiences friendships with Mexican vaqueros and a startling handshake with a white man. Juan Diego's attempt to dissuade him from the harsh life of a cowboy meets the response, ``I'm looking for the chance to tell my own feet where to go.'' When he joins Slim on a cattle drive to Kansas, Midnight risks the threat of bounty hunters and faces his own swelling anger and bad memories as he goes head to head with a menacing cougar. In a voice strong and true, Patrick's narrator easily carries the story, winning readers' hearts in an unusual combination of rip-roaring action scenes interspersed with internal monologues of self-discovery. This is a serious character study, work of historical fiction, and action-adventure rolled into one. (map) (Fiction. 9-12) -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 8 and up
  
• Hardcover: 152 pages
• Publisher: Henry Holt and Co. (BYR); 1st edition (October 15, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 080504714X
• ISBN-13: 978-0805047141
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.8 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,222,618 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Most Fun in an Historical Novel, July 6, 2003

By 

Panda (NY, NY USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Adventures of Midnight Son (Hardcover)

Midnight Son leaves the plantation and his family under the cover of night on a horse named Dohomey his Father provided for him for this purpose. The story follows Midnight on his journey to Mexico where he has freedom and then back into America as part of a cattle drive. We follow this 13 years old as he winds up on a ranch and eventually becomming a cowpoke.

We read this story out loud as a family with our 8 and 10 year old grandson and granddaughter. Both loved Midnight's adventures and I loved all it was teaching them about the last years of slavery in America and the life of a cowboy. Midnight is a very brave young man who shows great courage as well as helping so clearly teach children about life in the 1860's as America struggled with the issue of slavery. If you remove all the marvelous history lessons intergrated in the story, you still have a very compelling main character and a great adventure story.

Midnight Son's story is a wonderful book to share with your children.