#Shahnaz

[royal-confessions]

“The persian monarchy had the most beautiful women among the world's royalty, for example princess Shahnaz of Persia.” - Text & Image Submitted by cenacevedo15

[wannabe-british-fangirl]

~ books read in 2023 ~

#23: Midnight Strikes by Zeba Shahnaz

One night. You just have to survive here one more night.

Rating: 4/5

[bookaddict24-7]

(New Young Adult Releases Coming Out Today! (March 14th, 2023)

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Have I missed any new Young Adult releases? Have you added any of these books to your TBR? Let me know!

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New Standalones/First in a Series:

The Renaissance of Gwen Hathaway by Ashley Schumacher

Enter the Body by Joy McCullough

I Will Find You Again by Sarah Lyu

The Memory Eater by Rebecca Mahoney

A Long Stretch of Bad Days by Mindy McGinnis

Dear Medusa by Olivia A. Cole

The Next New Syrian Girl by Ream Shukairy

Ravensong by Cayla Fay

Flowerheart by Catherine Bakewell

Whistleblower by Kate Marchant

Enhanced by Candace Kade 

Climate Champions by Rachel Sarah 

Different for Boys by Patrick Ness

Midnight Strikes by Zeba Shahnaz

Stateless by Elizabeth Wein

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Happy reading!

[just0nemorepage]

Midnight Strikes || Zeba Shahnaz || 448 pages Top 3 Genres: Fantasy / Young Adult / Romance

Synopsis: Seventeen-year-old Anaïs just wants tonight to end. As an outsider at the kingdom’s glittering anniversary ball, she has no desire to rub shoulders with the nation’s most eligible (and pompous) bachelors—especially not the notoriously roguish Prince Leo. But at the stroke of midnight, an explosion rips through the palace, killing everyone in its path. Including her.

The last thing Anaïs sees is fire, smoke, chaos . . . and then she wakes up in her bedroom, hours before the ball. No one else remembers the deadly attack or believes her warnings of disaster.

Not even when it happens again. And again. And again.

If she’s going to escape this nightmarish time loop, Anaïs must take control of her own fate and stop the attack before it happens. But the court's gilded surface belies a rotten core, full of restless nobles grabbing at power, discontented commoners itching for revolution, and even royals who secretly dream of taking the throne. It's up to Anaïs to untangle these knots of deadly deceptions . . . if she can survive past midnight.

Publication Date: March 2023. / Average Rating: 3.73. / Number of Ratings: ~550.

[judgingbooksbycovers]

Airplane Mode: An Irreverent History of Travel

By Shahnaz Habib.

[richincolor]

Title: Midnight Strikes Author: Zeba Shahnaz Genres: Fantasy, Mystery, Romance Pages: 448 Publisher: Delacorte Press Review Copy: Received eARC via NetGalley Availability: Available now

Summary: Seventeen-year-old Anaïs just wants tonight to end. As an outsider at the kingdom’s glittering anniversary ball, she has no desire to rub shoulders with the nation’s most eligible (and pompous) bachelors—especially not the notoriously roguish Prince Leo. But at the stroke of midnight, an explosion rips through the palace, killing everyone in its path. Including her.

The last thing Anaïs sees is fire, smoke, chaos . . . and then she wakes up in her bedroom, hours before the ball. No one else remembers the deadly attack or believes her warnings of disaster.

Not even when it happens again. And again. And again.

If she’s going to escape this nightmarish time loop, Anaïs must take control of her own fate and stop the attack before it happens. But the court's gilded surface belies a rotten core, full of restless nobles grabbing at power, discontented commoners itching for revolution, and even royals who secretly dream of taking the throne. It's up to Anaïs to untangle these knots of deadly deceptions . . . if she can survive past midnight.

Review: [MIDNIGHT STRIKES is a time loop book, so there is a lot of violence and death for basically everyone, including references to Anaïs intentionally dying to reset the loop or requesting others kill her. Racism and colonialism are frequent topics as well.]

MIDNIGHT STRIKES is an immensely satisfying read. I love time loop plots but am also pretty picky about them—it takes a deft hand to keep the iterations of a time loop from getting boring or too predictable. Author Zeba Shahnaz did a fantastic job of deciding what to repeat, what to gloss over, and what to advance each time Anaïs woke up and had a new chance to figure out what was going on. It certainly helps that there is a lot that Anaïs needs to figure out, including why she’s even caught in the time loop in the first place. Anaïs would track down one plot thread, find out new information, recontextualize previous events, and then use that to follow a different thread further down its track. MIDNIGHT STRIKES is a truly well-crafted story in that regard.

And of course, what makes plot even better are great characters. Anaïs is an interesting narrator, and I appreciated her complexity. Being unhappy about the necessity of a political marriage is a fairly standard trope, but the layers Shahnaz added on to that really deepened both Anaïs’s character and the world building. I also appreciated that Anaïs wasn’t always positive and hopeful about being able to end the time loop—she had her rage and hopelessness and denial time loops, more than once. She did terrible things, often multiple times, and those decisions haunted her across the loops. I loved it.

The information Anaïs gets from each loop and the decisions she makes help her dig deeper into the people around her, which allowed some characters to gain depth instead of remaining shallow extras repeating the same things endlessly. Prince Leo is the most notable example, of course, and I found myself really enjoying the way Anaïs’s relationship with him changed over the course of the book. Due to the shortness of the loop and the limited locations, the number of characters who could gain depth was limited, but it still made for some very fun and satisfying character interactions in conjunction with the world building and mystery solving.

Recommendation: Get it now, especially if you’re a fan of time loops. MIDNIGHT STRIKES takes the grand spectacle of a ball and turns it into a nightmare, and then traps our main character there. Author Zeba Shahnaz did a fantastic job of varying the time loops and allowing Anaïs to claw her way towards answers regarding the explosion and why she was caught in the loop. I had such a fun time reading it and was immensely satisfied by how the story concluded.

[ezool]

ive been eating up Midnight Strikes by Zeba Shahnaz almost all day today this book has been so intriguing. and then to find out this is a debut novel blows my mind it's so well written and has me turning the page wanting more.

and then i find a listing of the beautiful Owlcrate special edition on pangobooks like YES, GIVE ME PLEASE

for those curious, imagine if instead of Cinderella's carriage turning into a pumpkin at midnight, the grand ball is attacked by armed intruders and explosions and everybody dies, with the added fact that Cinderella wakes up from dying at the ball in a Groundhogs Day time loop that she's the only one to remember. that's Midnight Strikes in it's most basic summary, but there's so much more.

the main character is also so realistic in like her reactions and stuff to having to repeat this deadly ball, and you can't help but root for her because she's also like an outsider at the ball so no one would even believe her if they wanted too. so there's a lot of intersectionality to the obstacles in her way of figuring out what the fuck is going on and why SHE'S the one stuck with this burden. and it's just so realistic. i love Anais so much.

i'm like a third of the way in, so here's hoping it sticks the landing by the end!🤞

[bookishlyvintage]

Midnight Stikes by Zeba Shahnaz (owlcrate edition)

[books-to-add-to-your-tbr]

Title: Midnight Strikes

Author: Zeba Shahnaz

Series or standalone: standalone

Publication year: 2023

Genres: fiction, fantasy, romance, science fiction, retelling, mystery

Blurb: 17-year-old Anaïs just wants tonight to end. As an outsider at the kingdom’s glittering anniversary ball, she has no desire to rub shoulders with the nation’s most eligible (and pompous) bachelors, especially not the notoriously roguish Prince Leo...but at the stroke of midnight, an explosion rips through the palace, killing everyone in its path, including her. The last thing Anaïs sees is fire, smoke, chaos...and then she wakes up in her bedroom, hours before the ball. No one else remembers the deadly attack, or believes her warnings of disaster...not even when it happens again...and again...and again. If she’s going to escape this nightmarish time loop, Anaïs must take control of her own fate and stop the attack before it happens...but the court’s gilded surface belies a rotten core full of restless nobles grabbing at power, discontented commoners itching for revolution, and even royals who secretly dream of taking the throne. It’s up to Anaïs to untangle these knots of deadly deceptions...if she can survive past midnight.

[someonelookingpraediti]

OwlCrate Unboxing

Let's Rewrite History March 2023

Can you credit it, all three of my regular book subscriptions turned up within an hour of each other yesterday! The exact opposite of an April Fools! Of course, this month I'm doing my annual box comparison, so I've ordered more some extra boxes, and I'm still waiting on one of those.

The OwlCrate theme is "Let's Rewrite History", and as a box it's quite cohesive, which sets it apart, despite the items being fairly middle-of-the-road.

The featured book is "Midnight Strikes", by Zeba Shahnaz, and it definitely has Cinderella vibes, which could either be really good or really awful. I'll add it to my TBR! The exclusive cover is, unfortunately, not as pretty as the original. It's such a bummer when that happens, because if you're going to the effort of redesigning a cover, you should be improving it, not just changing it for the sake of novelty. It's still fairly impressive though, because it's a soft-touch naked hardback, with the new artwork printed directly on to the case. It also has foiled endpapers, and gilded edges. As customisations go, that doesn't seem like much, but as OwlCrate rarely do decorated edges, this is a real win.

The first item out the box is a glass tumbler, inspired by "The Infernal Devices". I've got no interest in the series, I think the author is a terrible writer. And normally, I'm not that interested in tumblers. But this one, being glass, is quite cute? It looks like the sort of thing you'd want a summer punch in. Reusable straws absolutely disgust me, but this one, being glass, and therefore totally transparent, just seems like maybe it wouldn't be as unhygenic? Which is ridiculous, I know, but OCD does not follow logic. Anyway, visually, this is a really nice item, and it's great quality.

The next item is an eternal pencil. I'm not exactly sure what makes it eternal... it will run out eventually? Apparently it doesn't need sharpening, but there's not much graphite there, I don't know that it would last very long? I guess we'll have to see. To be honest, I'm fine with a regular old 2B. This one is inspired by "Babel", which is on my reading list. It looks like a pen, from the outside, which is interesting, and it's a nice design.

Up next, we have a pair of socks. These are trainer socks designed to look like a library loan card, like you used to get inside library books back in yesteryear. I love these, they're great quality, and they're both pretty and understated.

The last item is a book sleeve. I love book sleeves, so much. But now I've been getting subscription boxes for a significant time, I've developed quite the collection. I get rid of any I'm not fond of, but I still have way too many to actually use! This one has a quote on either side, one from "Kingdom of the Wicked" and the other from "Deathless". The design is gorgeous, my only issue is that the fabric makes the printing a bit unclear, so the quotes are hard to read. But it's probably going to be a sleeve I use quite a lot, I love the design.

This month's pin is inspired by "Once Upon a Broken Heart". This collection features a faux book design with hinges. It's a nice idea, but all ideas get old. The inside of this pin is gorgeous, but the "cover" of the book isn't as good.

Other than the pin, I'll probably use all of these items! So, all in all, a great box!

[mydarlinginej]

court romance with a time loop twist? sign me up! find out more about MIDNIGHT STRIKES by Zeba Shahnaz here:

[astralbooks]

Midnight Strikes - Zeba Shahnaz

Read: 11/03/2023 - 12/03/2023

Rating: 3/5

Rep: biracial bisexual side character, brown sapphic side character, side f/f relationship

CW: on page death (including of family members and of main character), suicide, murder, explosions & fire, violence, gun violence, racism & bigotry, referenced colonialism, bullying, reference to bestiality, referenced torture, alcohol consumption

Review:

When a series of bombs go off at the kingdom’s anniversary ball, Anaïs, along with everyone else in attendance, is killed. Then she wakes up a few hours earlier. Nobody else remembers what happened, or knows what’s going to happen. Unless she wants to be stuck in an unending loop of death and destruction for the rest of eternity, she needs to figure out who’s behind this attack and stop them before they can kill her, and the rest of the court, all over again.

I liked Anaïs! She starts the story as a reluctant ball attendee, being pressured by her parents into finding a husband despite knowing that nobody there wants to marry her and she doesn’t want to marry anybody there. Her initial reaction to being caught in the loop, and all her initial floundering, was very believable, as was the progression of what she found herself willing to do in order to try and break it. I really liked how she developed over the course of the story. I enjoyed seeing her building desperation to find a way out, her growing willingness to do increasingly audacious and at times deplorable things to try stopping the explosions, and her determination to find the right solution to the whole situation. As will be familiar from other well known time loop stories, being stuck in a time loop brought out the best version of herself, as well as maybe some elements of the worst version of herself.

The story does get dark, and a decent amount of this darkness stems from the fact that the loop is triggered by Anaïs’ death. If she wants to try the night again, she has to die. There were some loops that she may well have survived if she’d prioritised herself above all else, but the destruction and death toll aside from her was so high that she wanted to try again anyway, and that meant she had to find a way to die. Deliberately dying over and over in order to save the lives of others isn’t something that many people would be able to bring themselves to do, and it speaks volumes about Anaïs that she chose to help rather than run even though it would cost her like this.

Prince Leo was a really interesting character! Half the time he’s playing the role of the drunken younger prince with no responsibilities to speak of, but it becomes apparent that this is largely an act and a defence mechanism. He believes Anaïs more often than he doesn’t, which was a relief. Being stuck in a time loop is such a weird thing to lie about that if someone claims to be in one it’s always a better idea to believe them and skip the hassle, and he mostly does this well. The moment he’s given some kind of purpose for himself he drops all the acts and shows himself to be intelligent, down to earth, and at times downright heroic.

The development of the relationship between Leo and Anaïs is an interesting one. Leo doesn’t remember the loops, and so doesn’t remember Anaïs, so the most he can feel for her at the end of any given night is respect and maybe a crush. At no point is he in love with her. In contrast, Anaïs has a very long time to get to know Leo. I thought the jump between her realising that Leo was someone she could trust to her being in love with him was very quick and I wasn’t wholly convinced by it. However, I really liked how their relationship was written after this point! With every loop she’s not just giving up another chance at her own survival, but she’s giving up whatever dynamic she and Leo have managed to build that time around. She knows him, and she loves him, and she also knows that as long as the loops continue he’s never going to feel the same way about her. That’s something she just has to accept. There’s nothing she can do about it. This disconnect and mismatch in relationships is something that hits hard in time loop stories, and this was no exception. It’s tragic, and that’s the whole point.

In general, the emotions of Anaïs’ loop were well executed. Aside from the things I’ve already touched on, such as the growing disconnect in her relationships and her growing desperation and willingness to do things she ordinarily wouldn’t dream of, another thing this book addresses about the loops is the possibility of Anaïs getting so caught up in them that she deliberately and unnecessarily keeps herself in them indefinitely. If you theoretically have the power to manipulate events so they go exactly how you want them to go, at what point do you stop? At what point do you say you’ve done enough and let time resume its proper course? I thought the eventual resolution was an interesting one, and it’s one that I ultimately fall on the side of liking. 

There’s an attempt at an anti-colonial message in here, but it felt incomplete to me. It didn’t quite land.

The reason why I wanted to read this book in the first place is very simple: I love stories involving time loops. If I had to list out my top five pieces of media across all formats, three of those five involve time loops. I LOVE time loops. And, because I love time loops, I have high standards for them. A big part of what makes them so cool is the butterfly effect of it all, the only things that should be changing from loop to loop should be changing as a direct result of the actions of the person(s) at the centre of the loop. Unfortunately, this book emphatically doesn’t tick that box. I was convinced for a solid chunk of the book that Leo could remember the loops as well because he kept acting so drastically differently from loop to loop for no reason that him remembering the prior attempts was the most reasonable explanation. But no, he didn’t remember anything. He wasn’t the only one acting differently across loops with no explanation but it was most noticeable with him. If you’re not already a big lover of time loops then this might not bother you so much, but I am and it bothered me enough that I honestly nearly dnf’d the book over it. If the loops aren’t rewinding time but are putting her in slightly different alternate universes then just say that, y’know? That would be fine. But she never even considers the possibility. I fully acknowledge that this is a me problem lmao, as I said I have very high standards.

If you’re looking for a unique take on a glittering court fantasy with darker elements then you’ll probably enjoy this one! If you’re looking for a well executed time loop story then you might find that here, depending on how high your standards are and what your priorities are for them. It definitely hits on the emotions of a time loop, and that’s arguably the more important thing.

Thank you to Delacorte Press, NetGalley, and TBR and Beyond Tours for having me on this tour! You can find the full schedule here and the rest of my tour stop here

[therunwayarchive]

Shahnaz Indira at Roksanda, Spring 2023

[books-n-vibes]

Midnight Strikes

by Zeba Shahnaz, 2023

[kazifatagar]

Creating Transformational Education Programs, One School at a Time

[aisabazarshop]

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