Sophie is enjoying having more time to read now her son is back at school, and recently finished off Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore by Matthew Sullivan.

Lydia is a clerk at the Bright Ideas Bookstore, a small, independent store in Denver frequented by a number of lonely regulars known as the BookFrogs. Unbeknownst to many, she is also Little Lydia, the terrified ten-year-old survivor of an unsolved triple homicide which killed her friend Carol and Carol’s parents on the night of the girl’s sleepover, and whose photo made front pages across the country. Lydia has attempted to put her memories of the night she spent cowering beneath Carol’s sink from the Hammerman behind her, but one day a young BookFrog named Joey commits suicide in the store and leaves his possessions to Lydia, and her life quickly begins to unravel.

Sophie really enjoyed this book, although it does have some problems. She found that she had solved the mystery of the Hammerman’s identity early on in the story, and the other major reveal of the plot also felt rather forced, as if the author desperately wanted to tie everything together into one great big Lydia-centric knot. However, Joey’s coded messages to Lydia were clever, and his backstory–once fully revealed–was a true tragedy that no young man should ever suffer through. Sophie also particularly liked the central character of Lydia, who managed to come across as a survivor rather than a victim. She is a strong and determined character, yet the remains of past trauma are still there just as they would be for someone who went through such a traumatic event.

This is a story about victims, survivors, and the way people handle trauma. It is a book about people on the edge of society, and it is well worth your time.

This makes a real change.
A mystery with a real twist which keeps you guessing until very near the end.
A great story.

Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore starts unsurprisingly, with the store closing at midnight. We meet the main character, Lydia, almost immediately as she checks to see if a regular (Joey) is still in the store or not. Unfortunately, when she finds Joey, he has committed suicide and this book shows how Lydia is affected by his death. Right from the first chapter you are drawn into Lydia’s life and want to know more about her and the people who inhabit the book store.

Joey leaves Lydia the last of his belongings and as Lydia sifts between the fragments of Joey’s life she has to come to terms with how both their lives are intertwined. There are moments in this story that can only be described as creepy, where you are never sure what is going to happen next, and you wait with bated breath with Lydia as she discovers more about her own past, as well as Joey’s.

Lydia is someone who has spent her whole life slowly trying to rebuild a semblance of safety after a traumatic incident in her childhood. I will not mention what happened to her here, as part of the charm of the novel is the slow build up to this event and how her life was changed immeasurably, this led to Lydia not only changing her name but also making her run away when her past has been revealed. Lydia does not want to think about what happened to her, and it isn’t until Joey’s death that she is confronted by the past she had left behind as she sets out to find the answers to Joey’s suicide.

For all of Lydia’s emotional walls, she is a likeable character who has overcome a series of hardships to become the woman who now works at the Bright Ideas Bookstore. Lydia still has a lot of trust issues, that are revealed slowly over the course of the book. Lydia also discovers an inner strength as she delves into the heart of the ambiguity that was Joey’s life.

Initially, I picked up this book as I liked the title, I wasn’t sure what to expect, would it be a book about the people who worked at a book store, or alternatively a story about what happens at the book store after midnight. Instead, I got to read a story with a mystery that had profoundly affected Lydia’s life in and yet the story was so much larger than just one life. This is a book about secrets and the fragile safety nets we build around ourselves. Whether that is obscuring the past from our loved ones or inventing new histories so that we can disconnect from the events we have no control over. I really enjoyed reading this book and the intricate story within.

Don’t be fooled by that shiny cover. Darkness lies within! 3/5 stars.

My experience of this book suffered because I went into it expecting one thing, but got something else entirely. I think the cover and the blurb somehow made me think this was going to be more magical and mysterious than it was. And that there’d be more about books and the bookshop. Books about books are always a lure.

I liked the central mystery. It was unravelled carefully and at a good pace with a couple of big surprises. Details of the extremely traumatic incident in Lydia’s past are drip-fed to us slowly and when we finally get the full account of what happened I think it’s one of the most gripping, horrifying things I’ve ever read: some particularly brilliant writing in that section.

Unfortunately I didn’t connect with any of the characters which also put a dampener on my experience. It’s a shame because Midnight and the Bright Ideas Bookstore is an interesting combination of genres and if I’d cared more about Lydia then I’d have been truly hooked and swept along by her discoveries.

Overall: I can see why this book has so many fans. Sullivan has created a well-written, intriguing story with idiosyncratic settings and a decent central mystery. I’m just sorry it fell a little flat for me.

This book is fabulous, clever and compelling. A mystery to cherish, with a satisfying conclusion and great characters, very different and a complex plot. After ayoung man commits suicide in a bookstore, his favourite bookeseller is left his few worldly goods, and on closer inspection she finds that all his books have been cut up, eventually she works out the key to this strange behaviour, which leads her to discover some unpalatale truths. Herself hiding from a upsetting past, she discovers all is not what it seems.

A tightly woven mystery , with an original plot, a great puzzle and a really good ending. This book deserves to be a bestseller.

3.5 stars
This, Matthew J. Sullivan's first (solo) novel is well worth a read. Joey, one of the store's 'Bookfrogs' commits suicide from the rafters on the third floor and leaves all his worldly possessions, a muddled collection of books with pieces cut out of them, to Lydia one of the stores booksellers, leaving behind him a mystery to be solved. By immersing herself in Joey's 'legacy' Lydia starts to unfold the conundrum that was Joey and what lead him to take his life.

There were things that didn't quite sit right or weren't given enough attention in this novel and the ending felt rushed with a number of storylines left hanging BUT I have to judge it by how much I didn't want to put it down, and that was, to be fair, a whole lot. Even as I noticed the imperfections I was still hooked by the world of the Bright Ideas Bookstore. So, in short, some learning to be done by Mr Sullivan but a whole heap of potential. I'm looking forward to what he comes out with next.

Thanks to Netgalley for providing an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

This novel is about Lydia, a young woman with empathy abounding who works in the eponymous bookstore. She encourages her customers to read, pointing them in the direction of books they might like, holding back books that should be sent back to the publisher because they haven't sold. She is a sympathetic character and we immediately warm to her. At the beginning of the novel she discovers the body of one of her customers hanging from a ceiling beam. Joey was a vulnerable young man whom she had befriended and immediately she begins to wonder if she meant more to him than that when she finds on his body a photograph of herself as a child of ten. He has also left her his few possessions and she finds messages to her in these which force her to face up to her traumatic past. In tracing Joey's footsteps over the last few weeks of his life she finds that they lead her back into her childhood and ultimately the solution of a grisly crime.

The title of this novel is intriguing and the introduction with its very vivid description of a bookstore reminded me slightly of The Shadow of the Wind. In both books the authors' love of books shines through. The similarity ends there though . I enjoyed this book very much but I couldn't help wondering about the relevance of the title. Yes, the bookshop features largely in the novel but ultimately this is not what the book is about and I felt that there was a bit of a mismatch there. But I would recommend this atmospheric book.

A well written, good paced novel. A great story that keeps you turning page after page. Even if gruesome details are few and far between, the author artfully constructed a rather chilling atmosphere. There’s a foreboding tension following you as you progress with the story. Maybe is the unknown murdered, maybe the excruciating slow rate at which we find solid facts, maybe it’s because Lydia seems to be hiding etc, certain is that you just cannot stop wondering if the murderer will strike again, is he after Sylvia?! Each time you think you got this, something happens to make you doubt yourself. There are various layers to be discovered and I must advise you that it touches tough subjects like abandon, emotional abuse, neglect and it can be emotionally hard to read some pages, but it all adds up to make this book more that it looks at first sight!
My overall rating is 3.5*. This is mostly due to the fact that everything is revealed/solved at the 80% mark and the rest 20% of the book is just a long epilogue, if you like. That in itself is not a problem, but in my case I hate when it happens, I just cannot stop thinking there’s no point in reading until the end.

Lydia Smith lives a simple life working amongst the things she loves the most - books. At the Bright Ideas Bookstore she works ostensibly as a clerk but she's also a de facto mother, sister,social worker etc to the vast array of regular clientele who frequent the store, nicknamed the Bookfrogs. But one evening she discovers Joey Molina, one of her young bookfrogs has killed himself in the store. As one of his favourite clerks he left her his meagre possessions. These include several books seemingly randomly defaced but she soon realised there are messages to decipher and mysteries to solve within those pages.....messages and mysteries that force her to examine her own violent history and the unsolved murders by someone who came to be known as Hammerman.

Well written and instantly addictive, it took me a few hours inbetween irritating things like real life. The story is nicely unveiled, never revealing too much too soon. Lydia is an instantly relatable character, and there's a wealth of eccentric supporting characters. The only problem I found was I wanted to learn more about those characters from the book shop - they leapt from the page and I wanted more. Not your run of the mill mystery, an excellent read.

Having seen this recommended on an online book club I was delighted to be able to read and review. What I was expecting and what I read were vastly different, and in the best possible way. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Great characters, a really interesting plot and a bookstore as a location made this one a really good read. Loved it!

This is a really fascinating and eccentric tale set around a Bookshop. It centres round the life of Lydia smith, a sensitive and reclusive clerk at the shop. Her life is directed by her books and her buyers, or rather readers, the Book Frogs who wander around the shop. One day, Joey, one of the Book frogs, commits suicide in the History room at the shop. Lydia inherits all his possessions and is amazed to find that Joey had an old photo of her taken many years ago.
The mystery deepens when Lydia finds cut out windows in pages of books. Solving this ingenious puzzle leads to further revelations about her past.
It is a complex tale, intricately woven. The characterisations are slowly developed and we gradually learn, little by little, about Lydia's fears and pains. I found it to be a book that I could not put down.
Thanks to NetGalley for a copy in exchange for a review.

I found this book a slow starter and i struggled to carry on reading but once i got over half way a quite enjoyed it its just not whàt i was excepting

I appreciated the writing style. of this author. Excellent portrayal of the characters and liked the way the reader doesn't know immediately how the threads of the story will unfold. Would be interested to read more from this author

I'm not going to lie, when the blurb for this book was sent to me, I scan read it. I thought it would be a happy book about a bookstore and the greatness of being in one. HAHAHA. I couldn't have been more wrong. This is a THRILLER about a suicide that takes place in a bookstore. Good job I like thrillers then, isn't it?

Lydia Smith lives her life hiding in plain sight. A clerk at the Bright Ideas bookstore, she keeps a meticulously crafted existence among her beloved books, eccentric colleagues, and the 'BookFrogs'—the lost and lonely regulars who spend every day marauding the store’s overwhelmed shelves. But when youngest BookFrog Joey Molina kills himself in the bookstore’s upper level, Lydia’s life comes unglued. Always Joey’s

Always Joey’s favourite bookseller, Lydia has been bequeathed his meagre worldly possessions. But when Lydia pages through his books, she finds them defaced in ways both disturbing and inexplicable. They reveal the psyche of a young man on the verge of an emotional reckoning. And they seem to contain a hidden message. What did Joey know? And what does it have to do with Lydia? As Lydia untangles the mystery of Joey’s suicide, she unearths a long-buried memory from her own violent childhood and details from that one bloody night begin to circle back.

I know that I've put this book in the category of 3 stars, but it's more like 3.5 and the reasons it didn't get 4 stars and even 5 was because, for me, it had a really slow beginning. I struggled to try and get into it and it just took me ages to get to a point where I was really enjoying reading it. And then once I had gotten to that point, everything was fast-paced and I couldn't keep up with a number of mysteries that were being unravelled in the matter of a few chapters.

However, for a debut novel, Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore is a pretty good book. It has a solid plot idea that Sullivan carries strongly throughout the course of the novel and the big reveal at the end of the book left me in a shock - I definitely did not see that coming, which is brilliant because I'm pretty good when it comes to guessing big reveals in thrillers.





“It’s quite a library, anyway,” she said, trying to sound upbeat.

“I’ve begun to think of it as more graveyard than a library. End of the line, you know. Where book-of-the-month club comes to die.”

― Matthew J. Sullivan, Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore





This book doesn't fully centre around Joey's suicide. There are multiple storylines wrapped up together within this novel and mostly centres around Lydia and what she went through as a child. There were some aspects of this novel that was a bit far-fetched and I couldn't really see that happening but hey, it's a thriller, anything can happen, can't it?

The characters that really grabbed my attention were Lydia and Joey. I felt like they were the only multi-layered characters and had so much depth to them. I cannot say much about the characters or even about the plot because as with usual thrillers, even the slightest thing can give away a big plot point and I really do not want to ruin this book for you.

Overall, the storyline was well thought out and kept me on the edge of my seat apart from the slow beginning and even though the ending was fast-paced, every reveal ended up being a BIG shocker. Considering that this book is Sullivan's debut novel, it's very well written and I cannot wait to read more of his work.

Warning: this book contains triggers for suicide and childhood trauma.

Disclaimer: this book was sent to me by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Slow to get going but enjoyable. Cleverly written with many themes rolled together into one book.

Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore proved a fab find that easily rates a 4.5 for me. What, initially, seemed like a simple plot unfolded to show a wider, more satisfying, maze of intrigue. This is a bibliophile's dream mixed with a mystery and a quest for justice, of sorts. Meaty stuff that has solid legs to stand on.

Lydia leads a quiet life working as a bookseller, hiding away from the defining trauma of her youth, when she finds a bookfrog (Joey Molina) has committed suicide in the shop. The suicide is upsetting enough but she finds a clue from her past that Joey left expressly for her. What does it mean? Is it worth delving into an upsetting time in her life to find out?

There are more than a few interesting developments here that propel the reader on with vigor. Namely, the way the various threads interconnect so well and Lydia's reticence to explore her past and the connection with Joey's puzzling messages. This book is smart, well thought out and comfortable. Having worked in a bookstore, I know a little about the relationships formed with 'regulars'. It goes beyond friendship in a shared appreciation for the written word, like a secret club with a language all its own. MBIB took me back to that time and made me realize how much I miss that special comradery.

The Bright Ideas Bookstore seems to attract those lost souls in the world and give them hope ad peace amongst fellow minded 'Book Frogs'. But one day when one of the Book Frogs commits suicide in the bookstore, Lydia who has worked there for years, is sent on a journey of discovery both for herself, and those around her.

And that is where the magic of this book lies. So many genres cleverly woven together to construct a fascinating and often devastating world for those involved, and as a reader I found it to be such a touching book and one that I'm glad I stumbled across.

The codes left behind by Joey are a really clever twist and the fact that Lydia won't give up on discovering why Joey had a photo of her from her 10th birthday in his pocket when he died really shows her character and just how much the bookstore and its' visitors mean to her, and how so many different people can come together through their love of books.

There is also the back story of Lydia and her past, and that is another tragic story really well told and gives you more insight into the past Lydia had been trying to escape from, but finds she never really can leave the past behind.

The whole book is written with a great pace and is full of mystery, drama, family issues, twists and a great exploration of human emotions. Highly recommended!!

This is one of those books that takes you by surprise - it is a thriller but its also much more as it touches on human nature and the frailties that make us what we are. Lydia the heroine works in The Bright Ideas Bookstore and has been profoundly affected by an event from her childhood that has left her vulnerable and perhaps wary of others she doesn't really know. The death of one of the bookshop customers and the events that follow his death are the catalyst for finding out what happened to her and ultimately who was responsible - with a twist that I wasn't expecting and tugs at your heartstrings. I found this book to be entertaining and different, the characters came to life so you could envisage them in your mind and relate to them. The Bright Ideas Bookstore itself sounded wonderful - I wish there was one like it near me!

Lydia works at the Bright Ideas Bookshop in Denver surrounded by BookFrogs, the collection of quirky and tragic figures drawn to the warmth, security and comfort of the store. She is hiding her own tragic past, but the bookshop is somewhere that people don't ask questions. Until Joey, a young BookFrog, kills himself in the store and Lydia is drawn into investigating her own past and the events that occurred 20 years before.

This is an inventive and compelling murder mystery, but it's also much more than that. It's also an exploration of human relationships and the psychology of trauma, but is so cleverly and skilfully done that you just keep turning the pages to find out what happens next. The characters are realistic and it is easy to get caught up in their lives. My only criticism - and this is a personal thing - is that it is quite bleak in places.

Highly recommended for those who like contemporary crime novels, although be warned that there is nothing cosy about this mystery.

Great title, rather disappointing plot. The ending didn't work for me. The Hammerman scene was wonderfully terrifying though!