Midnight: A Gangster Love Story (1) (The Midnight Series) - Softcover

Souljah, Sister

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1416545360 ISBN 13: 9781416545361

Publisher: Atria/Emily Bestler Books, 2009

Synopsis

Sister Souljah, the hip-hop generation's number one author and most compelling storyteller, delivers a powerful story about love and loyalty, strength and family. In her bestselling novel, The Coldest Winter Ever, Sister Souljah introduced the world to Midnight, a brave but humble lieutenant to a prominent underworld businessman. Now, in a highly anticipated follow-up to her million-selling masterpiece, she brings readers into the life and dangerously close to the heart of this silent, fearless young man.

Raised in a wealthy, influential, Islamic African family, Midnight enjoys a life of comfort, confidence, and protection. Midnight's father provides him with a veil of privilege and deep, devoted love, but he never hides the truth about the fierce challenges of the world outside of his estate. So when Midnight's father's empire is attacked, he sends Midnight with his mother to the United States.

In the streets of Brooklyn, a young Midnight uses his Islamic mind-set and African intelligence to protect the ones he loves, build a business, reclaim his wealth and status, and remain true to his beliefs.

Midnight, a handsome and passionate young man, attracts many women. How he interacts and deals with them is a unique adventure. This is a highly sensual and tremendous love story about what a man is willing to risk and give to the women he loves most. Midnight will remain in your mind and beat in your heart for a lifetime.

Her "raw and true voice" (Publishers Weekly) will both soothe and arouse you. In a beautifully written and masterfully woven story, Sister Souljah has given us Midnight, and solidified her presence as the mother of all contemporary urban literature.

About this title

About the Author

Sister Souljah is best known for her work as a political activist and educator of underclass urban youth. A graduate of Rutgers University, she is a beloved personality in her own community. She lives in New York with her husband and son.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

1

Word to Life

I am not who you think I am. If you love me, you love me for the wrong reasons.

Females tell me they love me because I'm tall. They love when I stand over them and look down. They love when I lay them down and my height and body weight dominates them.

Females tell me they love me because I'm pure black. They say they never seen a black man so masculine, so pretty, so beautiful before.

Females say they love my eyes. They're jet black too. Women claim they find a passion in them so forceful that they'll do anything I say.

Females tell me they love my body. They beg me for a hug even when there's nothing between me and them. They want to be captured in my embrace, and press their breasts against my chest.

Some females ask if they can just touch me. Some tremble when my hands touch them. They say they love the muscles in my arms. They surrender when I lift them up. They whine and moan in rapture. Some cry their pleasure. Some shake. Some pee.

Some of 'em even say they love the way my teeth look in my mouth and how my feet look in my kicks.

Females tell me they love the way I walk, like I'm soon to own the world.

Most females say they love that I'm quiet. Then shiver when I finally talk.

All of the women show me that they love my guns, the fact that I walk with two of them at times. Even the ones who get scared fall in love with their fear of me. Then they come at me even harder.

Some females say I'm too serious, then shield their eyes to hide their feelings from the shine when I finally smile.

I can't lie, I enjoy the good times that some of these women offer me. But I don't take them to heart. I know that they don't really even know me. All the shit that they are in love with is just my style and my looks, all window dressing.

I know that a man is his own beliefs, his own ideas and actions. If you knew me, you would know what I believe. If you knew what I believe, then you would understand how I think. You would understand my ideas and actions. Only then should you decide. Either you believe what I believe, or you admire what I believe and want to get with those beliefs. If not, in the long run, we got nothing in common. I can't take you seriously. I gotta go. You got nothing that makes me want to stay.

I don't come from where you come from. I don't think like you do. My whole situation is different. I come from a country of real men who take real life, real serious.

I wouldn't trade places with an American-born man for any amount of cash.

Where I'm from, a son has a first name and three last names. The three last names are the names of his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. Any male who cannot identify his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather is already lost.

These three names are what makes a boy who he is. There is no talk of role models and celebrities. A son is raised under his father's wing, with a grandfather to guide and a great-grandfather as a blueprint, plus an army of uncles nearby.

Where I'm from, a man does not bow to any other man. A man bows down only to Allah. Only Allah created the heavens, the galaxies, the universe, and all of the millions of creatures within.

My father had three wives. Not one wife, one wifey, and a bunch of random bitches on the side.

Where I am from, a man wants to marry a woman and establish a strong family. A man can have more than one wife as long as he can treat them all fairly and provide them with love, separate homes, food, guidance, and presence.

There is no such thing as domestic drama. A woman feels fortunate to be selected by a quality husband, a family man, who will be by her side for her entire lifetime. Families are permanent.

When a man is ready to build his family, he selects a woman who he likes, who is from a family who raised her right, a woman who knows how to love and live. She has to be good for him, his beliefs, and plans for life. Someone who brings him peace, progress, and pleasure. Then he is down for her for real.

She is down for him too because she feels his strength, craves his love and attention, feels safe tucked at his side, and is confident that every day he is making the right moves for her, his family, and himself.

Our women don't argue with their man. A man knows what he is supposed to do and not do. It is the same thing he watched his own father do and not do. So he does it. Even if a man selects the wrong path, his punishment is between himself and Allah. His woman cannot punish him, judge him, or nag him to death.

In my country, a wife is not a whore or ex-whore. Every move a woman makes matters. She can bring dishonor to her man and family even with a simple glance at another man, if it is held for too long.

Even where I am from, there are whores. They know their place too. They stay within the walls of the illegal whorehouse, never to be glorified, honored, claimed, or married. A whore, where I am from, is the opposite of arrogant. She is used but never celebrated by decent men or women. She knows that she can never enjoy the lifestyle and contentment of a respected sister, daughter, mother, or wife.

The punishment for a good woman who comes from a good family and suddenly behaves whorish is severe. She will be isolated by her parents, family, and friends. Her father and mother may lock her away and confine her to one room in the house. In some cases, she is even murdered by her own husband, father, or brother for bringing shame and dishonor to her family and the people who raised, guided, loved, and provided for her.

The family member who commits the murder is not arrested. The whole country acknowledges that a woman is sacred. Every move she makes is either building her family up or breaking it down. Every thought she has is felt and considered by her children. Every word she speaks either teaches or misleads. She must remain honorable, pure, and righteous, otherwise there will be no happiness, no family, and no reason to exist.

Mouthing off; fucking her man's friends, brothers, and cousins; running away with the children; aborting the babies; lying about who is the father of her children; not knowing who the father is; yelling and disrespecting; doing drugs; drinking; parading around mostly naked; acting crazy; our men don't stand for that. We have not experienced that. We never will.

Our women know their place. They stay in it and live and thrive there. They remain there happily. Our women give love and are loved even more. She is respected, protected, and provided for. She lives proud and at peace.

Where I am from, liquor is illegal and forbidden. We believe that it makes a man behave with ignorance. After drinking liquor, the next step, we believe, is to disgrace God, and destroy yourself and your family.

In my country, homosexuality is nonexistent. For the absolute majority it is unknown and undone. There have been one or two of those who have traveled out to other places in Europe or America and come back with this bizarre behavior. However, they could never remain with us. Their homosexuality resulted in suicides, or they just turned up missing.

There are no tears for the man who enters into the exit, and builds a life where there can be no balance, reproduction, or family.

Where I am from, adultery is a crime for a man or a woman. Even to fuck someone else's sister or daughter just because you feel like it or like the way she looks, without approaching her family for marriage, means that you have brought about a battle between dishonored families, yours and hers. The man who commits adultery will be punished by his family. The woman who commits adultery will be considered ruined.

Where I am from, men work. Whether he works his own land and is paid in the foods the Earth produces; whether he works someone else's land; whether he is paid in cash, cattle, or otherwise; he works. Hard work is a man's way of providing for and demonstrating that he loves his family.

Each man must have a business of products or services. His product might be fish, meats, vegetables, fruits, jewelry, clothing, crafts, furniture, vehicles, parts and supplies, or other items. Or he may provide services as a doctor, carpenter, construction worker, engineer, lawyer, driver, educator, or performer. But no man can sit doing nothing. His family, backed up by the entire community, would never allow it.

When I talk about where I am from, which is almost never, both males and females feel uneasy. Some look at me in disbelief, like I'm a fucking liar. Others stare off in complete boredom, like it is not a life they would ever want to live. But I feel fine. People where I am from are happy, while almost everybody I know in America feels fucked up, empty, and dissatisfied, especially the Black people.

At fourteen years young, I became a citizen of the United States. It was supposed to be a great day, to be remembered for a lifetime. There we were, becoming a part of what is known as the best country in the world, America, after having been born and living inside of what Americans consider the worse place in the world, the continent of Africa.

We got dressed up and took the A train to City Hall in New York City. We recited some things that we had already memorized. Then it became official.

I should say it became legal. I was an American on paper. I never became one in my heart or mind.

The year I became an American was the same year I got locked up. I went from the projects, to juvenile detention, to prison. Each year I became more and more familiar with the American Blacks. The ones who look just like me. They range from very light skin to my rich dark color, as it is back home. When I first arrived, they were Afro-Americans, then Blacks, then African Americans, and eventually niggas.

They talked like they were the most powerful, clever motherfuckers on the planet. They looked down on other Blacks arriving from any other country in the world. They hated every accent besides their own. They was quick to ...

About this edition

• Publisher: Atria/Emily Bestler Books
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 1416545360
• ISBN 13: 9781416545361
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 512