Staff Book and Media Recommendations

Jean Longo is a Research & Learning Librarian at the University of Central Oklahoma.

The Light Between Oceans

By M.L. Stedman

PR9619.4 S735L54

Tom Sherbourne has returned from the Western Front un-maimed yet emotionally wounded, mourning the friends who have died and the men he has killed.  Back in Sydney he takes a job as a lighthouse keeper.  He is told that the job is “very tough and no picnic.”  His response is, “It’s not likely to be tougher than the Western Front.”  After six month as a relief keeper at Byron Bay he gets his permanent post on a distant Australian island called Janus Rock. He learns to love Janus, enjoying the quiet, sunrises, sunsets and the crowded sky of stars.   He knows how to care for the light with meticulous care and keeps careful records of each day. 

“On the Lights, you account for every single day.  You write up the log, you report what’s happened, you produce evidence that life goes on.”  This fact gets marred when he takes his young wife back to Janus.  She convinces him to keep a secret that causes him growing frustration and can only lead to disaster.  This is a ethically complex story but I could not help rooting for all these imperfect characters.

January 2015