In wartime Derbyshire, Col, evacuated to stay with his aunt, is looking forward to seeing his sister Rose for Christmas who is working in London. In a cottage in the countryside, some very unusual friends are stirring, willing him to find them.
When Col’s hopes for Christmas are dashed, he flees to Darkwell End, where his dad grew up and where he has happy memories of past holidays. Here is reunited with his imaginary friends, the Guardians, who have broken through from the spirit world to enlist his help to defeat an unseen enemy whose power is growing, plunging the world into darkness and the harshest of winters. When he needs some persuasion, they are forced to show him a terrifying vision of something he cannot ignore, and he and his Guardians embark on a desperate quest to save Rose from the chaos and destruction of the London Blitz.
On one level this is a thrilling adventure story that blends the myths and legends of Britain with a vivid depiction of a real historical event, in which the heroes encounter help and hindrance from characters both human and magical. It is also a poignant tale of the power of memory and familial love, and the important contribution they make to the process of grieving. Danger and sadness are however alleviated by a good measure of humour arising from the relationships between the characters. A great read!

Love, loss and London during the Blitz...

What a book...I loved it! A magical mix of action, adventure, and a moral tale about love and memories conquering darkness and evil. I cannot wait to use this in my classroom - it will have the children hanging on every word - I was!

The main character, Col, and his Guardians (3 imaginary friends: a badger, a tiger and a knight - conjured up by his late father to help him chase the 'Bogies under the bed' away in his younger years, and continuing to protect him from evil even now) run away from his cold, seemingly heartless Aunt Claire with whom he's been billeted as a refugee, in a desperate race across time to save his sister from a German bombing raid foreseen in an apocalyptic vision conjured for him by the evil Midwinter King who is seeking to rule the spirit realm, cross over and defeat The Green Man, and bring eternal winter to the world....PHEW!

Confused? It does seem like a mixture of genres - an evacuee story a la 'Goodnight Mr Tom', and more recently 'The Skylark's War' and 'Letters from the Lighthouse'; a giant big-cat Guardian, fighting knights and other-worldly battles with creatures a la 'Narnia' and the 'Lord of the Ring' adventures, and a Midwinter King reminiscent of Game of Thrones 'Night King', complete with his own skeleton horse, army of giants and dark-metal sword, and the threat of bringing winter, death and destruction to the human realm...

In short, it has all elements of the classic quest, and utilises these to great effect as we join the characters and get to know their own back-stories as the journey progresses and the inevitable face-to-face climatic confrontation between good and evil occurs...

There is laugh out loud humour - Gog and Magog the arguing giants are great - I can't wait to read their parts aloud in class - and there is tragedy and loss - Col's mum and dad, and the missing family of Ruth, a Jewish girl who joins his runaway team, to add into the mix of talking animals and size-changing tigers, and it works, making you feel the desperation in their urgent race to London. I particularly enjoyed the extracts from wartime newspapers that preceded many chapters, the tension heightened by the warnings of blackouts, incendiary devices and collapsing buildings, and adding a touch of historical fact and reality to the otherwise fantastical tale. The added nastiness of an incident in the Underground after the final battle, with an ugly character and his sadly-still held views shows Ross Montgomery not afraid to address and highlight challenging issues, and provides a welcome opportunity to use this text as a prompt for discussion of serious and challenging issues, sadly as current today as they were back then, as well as using it as simply a great classroom reader in it’s own right.

There has been a lot of hype around this novel, prior to its September release, with praise and online adulation from reviewers such as myself alongside other children's literature luminaries such as Katherine Rundell, Piers Torday and Sophie Anderson amongst others - none of them shy of a tall tale themselves! This tall tale deserves it all though - I absolutely loved it and can't wait to share in school...it's going to be a classroom favourite!

Thanks to Walker Books and NetGalley for the advance e-copy - I'm so glad I didn't have to wait until September!

I am unable to access this on my device. However, I cannot wait to read the book when it is available to purchase.

Like a previous reviewer, I am unable to access this title on my device. I am very much looking forward to it though and will be purchasing when I am able!

I was initially drawn in by the beautiful cover and the fact that this was absolutely all over my time line! And then I found out there were animal sidekicks, so obviously I was 100% invested right from the very beginning. This was a brilliant and enthralling fantastical tale set within a real-life event and I thoroughly enjoyed every second of reading it. The characters were fantastic and I loved the bickering between the guardians - particularly the King of Rogues constant mutterings! I went through a whirlwind of emotions, I was so invested and every moment tugged at my heart strings.

I particularly loved Mr Noakes: "And cook without proper seasoning? Be my guest! I might be a badger but I'm not a savage." I decided quickly that if anything happened to this little badger I would never read a book again.

Even when things seem at their darkest, there is always a flicker of light. The Midnight Guardians by Ross Montgomery is so much more than a story about the Second World War. It explores darkness, light, hope and love within layers and layers of meaning. Both the internal and external battles portrayed in this story will ring true with every reader on some level. On the surface, it is the story of Col, an evacuee in the Peak District. Living with his Aunt Claire, 150 miles away from home, he is desperate for his sister, Rose, to join him for Christmas. At the last minute, she sends a message saying she’s unable to come so Col and his new friend Ruth set off on a dangerous journey with three magical guardians to reach Rose before London is destroyed. A brave knight, a loyal badger and the most beautiful, powerful tiger are unlikely travelling companions but they understand Col, in fact, were created by him many years before and know better than anyone what needs to be done to keep him safe. Along the way, their adventures and the challenges they face reveal incredible truths about the world we live in. The power of childhood imagination is ignited by a very special kind of magic that surpasses any evil in the world.

This is a timeless story, not just for December 1940 when it is set or even just for now – it is a story for any time when the world seems too dark, when there is less magic in the world than there once was. It is a story that lights a candle of hope and shows children how to conquer fear. It reassures them that they are always protected in a pocket of love and can achieve more than they ever possibly imagined. With charm, humour and a warm spirit, Col’s three guardians show him that heroes come in all sorts of shapes and sizes and that there is nothing stronger than the power of love, family and friendship.

The rich symbolism in this story is powerful. The journey to London, each of Col’s guardians and the creatures they meet along the way represent far more than meets the eye and there is potential to delve deep into their meaning. The concepts of “dead of winter” and “dead of night” are matched with the Chanukah candles, Christmas, New Year and a celebration of light in dark times. The darkness, division and fear created by the evil Midwinter King thrive on the bleakness of the war. Sacrifice, determination and the power of the human spirit do everything they can to claim victory even in the darkest night.

In the classroom, this will be a valuable book for exploring the reality of life in Britain during the Blitz in December 1940. Ross Montgomery does not shy away from the description of the disasters so many families faced. From evacuees to despatch rider to emergency workers to ordinary families, the war hits hard. But this book takes readers to another level. The themes of loss, searching, and discovery are powerful for children and have so much potential for development. The use of various genres of writing with the story, such as newspaper articles and leaflets, model a wonderful “text within a text” style for children to emulate.

This book also has the potential to become a Christmas classic. With charming, loveable characters in the three Guardians, the magical scenes of Midwinter’s night and the on-going theme of light in the darkness, it will sit comfortably amongst other special holiday stories.

The Midnight Guardians is a story of teamwork, of everyone working together playing their part, but it also a story of the power of just one person. One person is important. One person can make a difference. It is a story of sanctuary – safe places and safe people. Special guardians and ancient places where magic still flows and protects in love. Thoughts of these things will stay with readers long after the story has ended.

Thank you to NetGalley and Walker Books for this incredible story which will be published in September 2020.

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It’s over thirty years since I watched the BBC adaptation of the classic children’s story ‘The Box of Delights’ by John Masefield in the run up to Christmas that year but the magic of the story has stayed with me. Having read it, and loved it, several years ago as an adult nothing has ever come close to it. Until now.

Opening on the darkest night of the year – the winter solstice – in 1940, we are introduced to three very different individuals: a knight in shining armour, a pipe-smoking badger and a Bengal tiger all of whom are sat around a single candle in a cottage which has seen no sign of life in months eagerly awaiting the arrival of Col, identified by the tiger as: ‘the only hope we have’.

And so we encounter Col, on his way back to the place he temporarily calls home having been evacuated to his aunt’s home in Buxton six months previously from his London home in an attempt to keep him safe. Like many children at this time of the year, Col is excited – not in anticipation of the expensive gifts and endless food that many of today’s children would expect but rather at the thought of being reunited with older sister Rose, his only immediate living relative following the death of his father prior to his evacuation.

Sadly, Col is dealt a terrible blow when he reads a letter from Rose explaining that she is staying in London for the festive season to make her contribution to the war effort by helping at a nurses’ station and undertaking despatch duties. Unable to cope with this disappointment on top of everything else, Col leaves the house and driven by voices in his head calling to him, travels to the cottage where he had spent the idyllic Christmases of his earlier childhood. It is here that he is reunited with the Guardians to whom we have already been introduced.

The Guardians, it transpires, are imaginary companions from happier times and Col cannot quite believe that they are real after putting such childish ideas behind him of late. The Guardians explain that they have come from the Spirit World, where all imagined creatures live and have come to warn Col of the Midwinter King who having driven the Green Man from there intends to overthrow the natural order of things and bring about a winter that never ends. After being shown an apocalyptic vision of London being destroyed in the very-near future, Col agrees to journey to London with the Guardians to try to save Rose.

Of course, the journey is not a smooth one. Along the way the companions encounter walking-talking trees, fairies, giants and other humans who may or may not be on their side as the Midwinter King and his minions try to stop them. It will take all of their strength of character to prevent Rose’s death and enable the balance between the dark of the Midwinter King and the light of the Green Man to be maintained.

The mix of magic and real-life history is beautifully balanced here, with the Christmassy feeling of the story running through it very subtly so that this does not need to be limited to being read at that time of the year. As with Kit Harker who returns home for the festive season in The Box of Delights, Col is complemented by a mixture of human and magical characters here. These are all well-thought out and described in great detail so that I found it very easy to picture them as I read further. There is also a great deal of humour within the story which balanced out the darker parts of the book, with the most dark not being related to magic but to the inhumanity of one person or group to another. While the story refers regularly to the bombing of several British cities, I found the attitude of a very minor character close to the end towards one of Col’s friends very sad, knowing that there are still people who judge others badly in this day and age for the most ridiculous and ignorant of reasons.

As an adult reading this, I’m very aware of British history and World War II and the Blitz – my own mother was born in late 1940 under a table during an air raid – and that really ramped up my emotional involvement in the book. I so wanted a happy ending for Col and the guardians but was not convinced that I would be getting one when for so many families there wasn’t. For children, the history may well be incidental, but I suspect there will be many class teachers using this as a class reader when teaching this period and a great many, like myself, who will read it simply because it is a great book.

I absolutely adored this – I’ve read quite a few middle grade books so far this year and of those this is definitely one of my very favourites – one that I will be purchasing a ‘real’ copy of following its publication on September 3rd this year. Until then, I am enormously grateful to Net Galley for allowing me to read it in advance.

A beautifully worded book, set against a backdrop of WW2 making it fit the uk KS2 curriculum perfectly yet with the guardians being superb characters bringing a whole new twist into the story. I love the constant battle between good and evil, darkness and light. The enduring message of hope and resilience making it even more relevant to today's children. Overall a fantastic book that I will be sharing with as many children as I can.

I can't give a review of this book as I don't read on my computer and can't access protected pdfs on my Kindle