What do you do when strange things happen around you?
The Midnight Children trilogy is a series of dark fantasy novels for children age 8-13 combining Asian mythology and Gothic elements.
The characters, ten-year-old Min and twelve-year-old Zak are the main protagonists. In The Midnight Children- Cemetery House, Min and her mother move into Cemetery House with the distasteful Uncle Obb. Zak has been taken to the Moonlight Lands but flees from the oily creatures on a boat. He finds help at a river-side village but is betrayed by a village shaman and is almost trampled by a man-horse. Min, in the meantime, discovers a book and using its magic brings Zak back. They meet Shaz, the shaman, once again in the cemetery and he gives them a magic bottle.
After almost being killed by a vampire, Min and Zak learn that their mother is in hospital but, before they can visit her, Uncle Obb locks them in a dog cage so that the oily creatures can kidnap them that night. Zak kills the two oily creatures using the magic bottle but Uncle Obb kidnaps Min at knifepoint and takes her to the Moonlight Lands.