Tea & A Good Book Brewing- Installment 15, The Light Between Oceans

Welcome to the very first Book of the Month review! 

I should say here that this is set up more as a discussion than a review and that my questions and answers are not going to make a lot of sense to you unless you have read the book! However, you may get a sense as to whether or not you would be interested in the book by reading over the discussion! Better yet, maybe your interest will even be piqued enough to read the book and enter into the discussion yourself, which would suit my purposes pretty well, come to think of it!!!

For anyone who wishes to join the discussion, just leave your remarks/answers to the questions found in this post in the comment section below.

I have been looking forward to talking about January's book, The Light Between Oceans, and hearing what others who have joined me in reading this book have to say about it!

Before we begin, however, we must set the perfect ambience for a book discussion...

Picture coming in out of the cold to a room alive with the crackle of firelight. Picture kicking off snowy shoes and curling up on comfortable couches and chairs. Picture scones hot from the oven. Picture the perfect pot of tea (pardon my snobbery, but you can't have scones with anything but a proper cup of tea!).

Now, best of all, picture the faces of some of your favorite people to have a good discussion with! 

There, I have just created what for me would be about as perfect an evening as I can imagine! So perfect, in fact, that this blog review is looking like a pretty poor substitute!!! But shall we settle for second best?

Yes, let us...life is too short to do otherwise!!!

1. Which of the two main characters do you identify most with throughout the story: Tom or Isabel? 
    I identified the most with Tom. I am often very duty-bound and would tend to "stick to the rules" if for no other reason than to avoid either personal guilt or disapproval from others. Even when confronted with an emotional appeal, it can be hard to lay these habits down. 

2. Isabel justified keeping Lucy because of her own losses. Can you sympathize with that logic?
   It's second nature to try to find replacements for real or perceived voids in our life and to feel that the end justifies the means or that we deserve something. That's where Isabel was when she kept Lucy and I am not immune to that trap. Once we have settled into the victim mentality, it is easy for our "needs" win out over common sense.  

3. Who do you think had the "right" to Lucy: her birth mother (Hannah) or Isabel?
    The author sets the stage for our sympathies to rest with Isabel, since we know her story so much better by the time the birth mother is introduced into the plot, but I would still say that, ultimately, Hannah had the "right" to Lucy (or Grace, as the case may be!)  

4. Do you agree with the philosophy that "sometimes, forgetting is the only way back to normality?" (refer to page 276 for this quote and background.)
    I don't agree with it from a Christian worldview- where I believe God wants to redeem us, not just have us forget- but sometimes it does seem that "moving on" is the only way back to normalicy. Poking at a scab rarely helps a wound to heal...but forgetting is not healing, either, so we're back to God's way being the only way forward after tragedy or wrong-doing.     

5. What is a favorite scene/passage from the book? 

    The whole thing of living on an island all by oneself and being a lighthouse keeper is intriguing to me, so I enjoyed the book most where Tom and Isabel lived on Janus, full of young love and hope.   

6. Is there a moral/lesson that you took away from the story? 
    It really is true that we shape not only our own lives but the lives of those around us by our moment-to-moment decisions. It is also true that even if we live on an island, what we do still has consequences, no matter what.

7. Were you satisfied with the outcome of the story or is there something you would write differently if you were to change the ending? 
    I wish that Isabel had been able to see Lucy again before she died, but having Tom see her again was indeed satisfactory. 

The tea and scones are gone- in reality as well as in my little imaginary scene- and the ticking clock signals the end of the discussion.

I might just add, though, by way of wrapping it all up, that this was a spellbinding book. The plot is fascinating and gripping as it moves through some very keen emotion and drama and there were times when I could hardly bear to keep reading for fear of what came next and yet I certainly could not bear laying it down, either, for fear of not knowing!!! There are many different facets to this story and I know I didn't do them all justice, so I look forward to hearing from you!

Thanks for joining me! Let's do it again soon.

And just so you're forewarned, if you borrow a copy of The Light Between Oceans from the same library I did and a few crumbs fall out from between the pages, you'll know you have me and the scones to thank...

And were they ever delicious...