The World at Midnight

From #1 New York Times bestselling Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants author Ann Brashares and her brother Ben Brashares comes the third and final book in the action-packed middle grade alternate history thriller trilogy that asks what present-day America would be like if Germany had won World War II.

Henry, Frances, and Lukas are still stuck in Westfallen in 2023. They're out of ideas on how to get home until they discover a series of historical comic books that outline how Nazi high command in Germany found out the details of D-Day. Now they've got to work with their friends Alice, Lawrence, and Artie in 1944 to follow the clues in the comic books to stop the message from getting across the Atlantic.

Lukas has been conscripted to play baseball--normally impossible for a Jewish kid in Westfallen, but his talent is undeniable--and he's got to find a way to stay on the team and stay alive when everyone around him wants to see him fail or worse. That gets tougher when a scrappy Jewish orphan and runaway starts following him and hiding under his bed.

Meanwhile, in 1944, Artie finds out his German-born father is more involved in helping the Nazi cause than he realized--and when his father steals the radio that allows them to talk with kids across time, everything they've worked for is threatened. And once Henry discovers there's way more to the mysterious well than any of them ever imagined, it's going to take all six kids' courage, ingenuity, and a bit of luck to swim against the tide of time and restore the future.

Author: Ann Brashares,Ben Brashares
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Published: 09/15/2026
Pages: 384
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.00lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.50w x 1.30d
ISBN: 9781665950879
Audience: Ages 9-12


Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 07/15/2026
School Library Journal 06/26/2026 pg. 1

About the Author
Ann Brashares is a writer and mother of four living in New York City. She is the author of the #1 New York Times bestselling Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series as well as several other novels. Before becoming a novelist, she was a student of philosophy, a receptionist, an editor, a ghostwriter, and briefly, the copresident of a small media company. Before that, she grew up in Washington, DC, with her three brothers and a stunning number of weird pets. She helped her youngest brother, Ben, with his socks and shoes every morning before school until he learned to tie his own shoes himself, around ninth grade.

Ben Brashares lives with his wife and three kids in Montclair, New Jersey. He is the author of two children's books, Being Edie Is Hard Today and The Great Whipplethorp Bug Collection. He holds an MFA in creative writing and has worked at and written for several magazines, including Rolling Stone and Men's Journal. He spent much of his youth wading through heaps of clothes in his big sister's room looking for the family's escape-artist tarantula, Fredricka. He may or may not have put Frederika on his sister's head while she slept.