Midnight at the Blackbird Caféby Heather Webber
Rating: ★★★★
isbn: 9781250198594
Publication Date: July 16, 2019
Pages: 336
Genre: Magical Realism
Publisher: Forge
Nestled in the mountain shadows of Alabama lies the little town of Wicklow. It is here that Anna Kate has returned to bury her beloved Granny Zee, owner of the Blackbird Café.
It was supposed to be a quick trip to close the café and settle her grandmother’s estate, but despite her best intentions to avoid forming ties or even getting to know her father’s side of the family, Anna Kate finds herself inexplicably drawn to the quirky Southern town her mother ran away from so many years ago, and the mysterious blackbird pie everybody can’t stop talking about.
As the truth about her past slowly becomes clear, Anna Kate will need to decide if this lone blackbird will finally be able to take her broken wings and fly.
I’ve been struggling all week with the logic failure of a local government that builds a heated, indoor pool billed as a rehabilitation pool, then not only opens it up to children, but books it just about rock-solid with swimming lessons, leaving the oldies and the injured cowering in corners of the pool while parents let their young ones run amok like it’s a water park, not a rehabilitation pool.
All that to say I needed a comfort read this weekend. The kind of comfort only magical realism can provide at the moment. Midnight at the Blackbird Café was sitting on my shelf, and brought to mind by my recent read of Webber’s newest magical realism book, The Lights of Sugarberry Cove. I read Midnight when it first came out in 2019, and I’d forgotten enough that it was time to re-visit it.
In my original review, my biggest issue was that “The power of love is a wonderful thing indeed, but my nature is not one that is comfortable with being immersed in heart tugging storylines.” This time around, that wasn’t so much an issue; either I was prepared for it, or I’ve read enough contemporary/MR since that I’m more accustomed to it.
What I did notice this time around, following as it did on the heels of The Lights of Sugarberry Cove, was the pacing. This one started off much more slowly for me. In fact it dragged for the first few chapters, until the two main characters started interacting with each other. Once we’re there, the story finds its groove and it hummed along nicely for me.
I probably should have knocked the rating down to 3.5 stars because of the two, I like The Lights of Sugarberry Cove better, and because there’s no way any reader doesn’t know how this story ends. But it’s meant to be a feel-good novel, and a comfort read. I was comforted and felt better after reading it, so I’ll keep it at 4 stars.