We Are the Light
Ratings17
Average rating3.6
15
Ratings17
Average rating3.6
From Matthew Quick, the New York Times bestselling author of The Silver Linings Playbook—made into the Academy Award–winning movie starring Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper—comes a poignant and hopeful novel about a widower who takes in a grieving teenager and inspires a magical revival in their small town. Lucas Goodgame lives in Majestic, Pennsylvania, a quaint suburb that has been torn apart by a recent tragedy. Everyone in Majestic sees Lucas as a hero—everyone, that is, except Lucas himself. Insisting that his deceased wife, Darcy, visits him every night in the form of an angel, Lucas spends his time writing letters to his former Jungian analyst, Karl. It is only when Eli, an eighteen-year-old young man whom the community has ostracized, begins camping out in Lucas’s backyard that an unlikely alliance takes shape and the two embark on a journey to heal their neighbors and, most importantly, themselves. From Matthew Quick, whose work has been described by the Boston Herald as “like going to your favorite restaurant. You just know it is going to be good,” We Are the Light is an unforgettable novel about the quicksand of grief and the daily miracle of love. The humorous, soul-baring story of Lucas Goodgame offers an antidote to toxic masculinity and celebrates the healing power of art. In this tale that will stay with you long after the final page is turned, Quick reminds us that life is full of guardian angels.
Reviews with the most likes.
I wasn't sure what to expect going into this. I loved the notion of a book that included the presence of guardian angels, so I took the chance.
After a tragic incident in town, Lucas is grieving the death of his wife and battling the survivor's guilt that goes along with it. The way he copes is by writing a series of letters to his former analyst. These letters go unreplied, but he persists. In the meantime, he befriends Eli, a young man Lucas finds camping in his yard. They forge a friendship and begin a project together that further helps the healing process.
I enjoyed the structure of the book as well as the psychology involved. It was also an interesting interpretation of angels and how so often when we lose someone close to us there's a part of them that we hang on to. It manifests itself in different ways for each of us. As for the story itself, something was lacking for me. I didn't remain invested all the way through. Still, I enjoyed it perhaps more than I thought I would.
This book was really good, about how we go through grief and heal at our own pace. I really liked the epistolary format here, and Luke Kirby should narrate most things.This one definitely reminded me of Silver Lining Playbook in vibe and writing style. I did call almost the whole ending really early on, which for something playing information so close to the chest, I wish was more of a surprise. Still a really good novel.
My full review is posted at https://literaryquicksand.com/2022/10/review-we-are-the-light-by-matthew-quick/
This book made me remember being in college in my English classes, talking about unreliable narrators. Lucas Goodgame really came off as an unreliable narrator, and he has a really good excuse: trauma.
The community of Majestic has experienced a tragedy, and the whole town is affected – especially the people with loved ones who perished in the tragedy.
In short, there's been a shooting in a movie theater, and Lucas's wife was shot and killed. The whole book is told in letters after the tragedy that Lucas writes to his therapist, who doesn't answer any of the letters. So, it's a narrative from a man in a deep depression who's seeing his wife appearing to him as an angel.
The best part of this book is Lucas's relationship with Eli. They're two people who clearly need camaraderie and somewhere to put their weird grief energy (which really is a real grief thing).
The grief and mental health stuff in this book was really well done, which I definitely expected from the author of The Silver Linings Playbook. Quick has a way of getting so deeply into the minds of his characters, and somehow conveying the complexity of their emotion to the reader.
