What Light Review

What Light by Jay Asher is a young adult contemporary novel set over Christmas time. It is about Sierra who’s family runs a tree farm in Oregon and every Thanksgiving to Christmas the three of them drive out to California to run their tree lot. Times being hard, this could be their last year, so new relationships are definitely not in her plans, but then Caleb walks onto the lot.

I gave this book 4 out of 5 stars. It was a deep and bittersweet story. There was more depth to the plot and events of the story than I was expecting. If you are looking for a heartwarming Christmasy fluff novel, this isn’t it. This is a very thought provoking story. It is still pretty fast paced, but I slowed down a bit to really think through some of the issues he was dealing with.

The characters were well developed, interesting and flawed. They evoked a large variety of emotions from me. I was quite invested in Sierra and her story. Everyone in the story felt like they could be real and responded pretty realistically to every situation.

My only disappointment is that I wasn’t really in the mood for something of this style when I read it. I was looking for a fluffier and happier story. But that is a reflection of my expectations / hopes put on the book, not an accurate reflection of the quality of the book (which was excellent), and I would probably have liked it even more if I had been in the right mood.