Customer Reviews

The Lightkeeper's Daughter (Readers Circle (Prebound))

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Iain Lawrence does an excellent job of bringing his reader back and forth between what his main character Squid remembers as a child growing up on Lizzie Island and what she feels now, at the age of 17, as she returns to the island to see her parents after she went away to have the baby she became pregnant with at 13.
This book lets readers think about how they saw things as a child and how they realize how their thoughts and ideas have changed as an adult or even young adult as they follow Squid through this realization.
Lawrence's description of the island and the family that lives on this lonely island are captivating. You are instantly brought into a lightkeeper's life with his great imagery, and I thought once I could smell the salt in the air of my living room.
Even though this book was almost 250 pages, it was an easy and fast read that left me wanting to know what had really taken place on the island, what really happened to Squid's brother who mysteriously died before she left the island, and how her daughter, the baby girl she left the island to have, will react to this mysterious and lonely island, as well as her grandparents.

" 'Gather round.' He always said 'Gather round' to start it off. Squid was six or seven.
"Hannah, Squid, and Alastair sat on the rocks as sharp as nails. 'This is the byssus,' said Murray, spreading with his fingers the cottony threads that held the mussel to its rock. 'It's spun by a gland in the animal's foot. He lashes himself in place like Ulysses to his mast.' "He turned the shell in his hand. It was a California mussel, nearly eight inches long. He pointed out the scars along the shell, like patches of white on its deep purple back. 'This fellow,' he said, 'has had some sort of an accident. He might have been wacked by a log.' The scars were deep, and Murray picked at the grooves with his nails. 'The poor brute almost bought it there. Must have got the fright of his life.'
" 'How old is he?' asked Alistair.
" 'Hard to say.' Murray bounced the mussel in his palm. 'He's an old-timer, all right. They grow like weeds in the beginning; more than three inches the first year. But then they slow down, and this one's lived on the island maybe as long as I have.' "

Imagine being Murray and Hannah's kid: growing up on an island, learning how to swim before you walk, working with your parents for a few hours in the morning, and then having the rest of the day for exploring, reading, playing, dreaming, and listening to your father rhapsodize about the mysteries of the plant and animal kingdoms around you. Hop into a glass-bottomed rowboat he's built, paddle out into the water as you observe the creatures below, and then stow the oars as whales breach and blow alongside you.

Hungry? Need a new book? Don't worry! Supply ships come by the island every month so that you've got plenty of food, fuel, supplies, clothes, and books to read.

There is a downside, however.

Throughout the years of growing up, the only human contact that you have outside of your parents and sibling are those monthly supply ships and the voices of the other lightkeepers over the radio system, reporting the weathers every few hours.

THE LIGHTKEEPER'S DAUGHTER is the story of Squid (Elizabeth) and Alistair growing up on remote Lizzie Island, off the coast of British Columbia. It is told looking back, four years after Alistair had drowned, when seventeen year-old Squid brings her three year-old daughter to the island for the first time. It is a mysterious and taut tale about what went so terribly wrong with their idyllic existence on the island.

" 'Humpbacks sing,' said Murray. 'Did you know that?'
"She shook her head.
" 'Each year one of them starts a song. Then others pick it up; they lengthen it and change it.' He spoke softly--he always did--looking out to sea and not at her. 'By the middle of summer they all know the song. They sing in a chorus over hundreds of miles.'
"She leaned her head against his shoulder. She could feel him breathing, and she tried to do what the whales were doing, and time her breath to his.

" 'No one knew,' said Murray. 'Until the war. Then someone put a microphone in the water, hoping to hear submarines. They heard this singing instead. And they didn't know what the hell it was.' "She pressed herself against him. She was shivering, but he didn't notice.
" 'I don't understand it,' he said.
" 'The song?' she asked.
"He shook his head. 'Och, we'll never understand that. I mean how men could kill them.'
" 'No,' she said.'
"He sighed. 'They're wonderful things, whales are. They're miraculous.' "

This is a story that is haunting and bittersweet, a setting that is utterly entrancing. Murray has no use for civilization--he hasn't been off of the island since leaving school and taking over from the last lightkeeper. Hannah washed up on the shore a couple of decades after Murray arrived. The kids soon followed. Bit by bit the two children and their mother reveal the secrets of their lives with Murray, a barnacle of a man who has a life or death grip on the island. My own head will remain cemented to Lizzie Island and these characters for some time to come.

Richie Partington
http://richiespicks.com
BudNotBuddy@aol.com

Set on a remote island on the western coast of Canada against a backdrop of wicked storms, anguished memories, and vast loneliness comes the beautiful and poignant story of 17 year old Squid and her family, the Mc Craes. Though much of the story is about Squid, the story is told mostly from the perspective and memories of Squid's mother Hannah, as the reader is drawn into the world of separation, and reunion.

Growing up on the remote Lizzie Island and as a lightkeeper's daughter, Squid could swim before she could walk, and had only met 50 people in her entire 17 years. Squid returns to the island after three years separation with her three year old daughter Tatiana in tow. The reunion is painful, and redeeming, much of it bringing back memories of accidental or perhaps suicidal drowning of Squid's brother Alistar, and of Squid's pregancy from a lone kyaker when she was 13 years old. Much of the conflict in this story stems from the death of Alistar and how each member of the family deals with the regret, guilt, and loss, and from the difficulties and beauty of living daily with isolation and often violent nature.

I loved this book, and think it would be a wonderful read for the older thoughtful teen reader. I thought the rating as a 14+ teen novel was misleading as the slow poetic pace and thought provoking nature of the book might not capture the attention of the average teen. But, the gift in this book for me was truly the beautiful langugage Lawrence weaves throught out the story...The descriptions of the sea and rugged beauty of the island were truly captivating.

The Light Keepers Daughter

This book was strange but really interesting. At first I thought that the book was bad but as soon as I kept on reading, it started to get a lot better. The book has a lot of twisted and turns in it. Although squid loves her dad she blames him for everything that happens, like her brother dying. I like this book cause it was different. Not every book is about islands and light keepers. This girl that is the main character is so much like anything, or me, that I wish that I never had to go home like that. She is always having fun and running around. I really like it and would recommend this to anyone who likes fun fictional books. One thing I didn't like was how they would talk about how the past was, and then they would talk about the future bounce back and forth between the past and future and sometimes they would lose me. It talked about people in the third person a lot which was kind also of confusing.

Recommended for older readers is Iain Lawrence's Lightkeeper's Daughter, a story of seventeen-year-old Squid, who returns home to her parents' isolated life on an island bringing with her a young daughter. Squid has a lot to face before she moves away from her parents: she resents them for their isolated life, blames them for her brother's untimely death, and seeks a closeness with them which might never be. Lightkeeper's Daughter is a warmly recommended story of family differences, strife, and the effects of an isolated environment on the family unit.

This was a very strange book. I picked it up on a whim for some light reading and because I was attracted to the cover. It's considered a juvenile fiction book, but I've found some very entertaining and well written books in that section so I wouldn't consider it a reason to not read the book if you are an adult.

Seventeen year old Squid (real name Elizabeth) is on a boat with her three year old daughter Tatiana traveling to an island that was her home for thirteen years. She's very apprehensive about the trip and what her mother and father, Helen and Murray, will think about her daughter, and what they will think about her since they haven't seen each other for years. Just thinking about the island brings back terrible memories as her brother Alastair had died there shortly before she left to give birth to her daughter. When she lands, its hard to see her parents and remember all the pain that they and the island brought by keeping her and her brother isolated there.

When she can, she escapes to the smaller house on the island where her brother had lived and reads his journals. They are filled with pain and his longing to leave the island and bring back memories for her of when they were small and traveling around the waters and island together. She reads these notes in secret and hopes that her mother and father won't find out about this, but she shouldn't worry too much as they have found distraction in her daughter. All these painful memories make her want to leave though but for the first time her daughter seems to be thriving. She's not sure what the best route to take would be.

These characters make up a very confused family. At times its painful to watch them interact with each other. This however, serves to make them very human and I do think that they were well written in this case. One complaint I would have in characterization would be Squid's reactions to some things. At times she acts like a normal seventeen year old and can get huffy at nearly anything, but the majority of the time she acts very old and mature. Granted she had a child young and had to grow up fast but it didn't feel authentic to me. There was just a sense that her character really didn't act like a seventeen year old most of the time.

The writing was in the third person and was written very clearly. Lawrence did an excellent job of keeping his writing level at a point that wasn't too mature for the juvenile crowd, but not too immature to make them avoid the book thinking it was for younger children. It deals with a lot of weighty topics and to my opinion, would appeal to the moodiness that some teenagers have at that age. That being said there were some things I was disappointed in. The book was written in third person and jumps around from Alastair's journal, to bits of the past Squid remembers, and the present time in which she is visiting. Normally this wouldn't' be a problem but its very choppily done in this book. It definitely could have flowed much smoother between transitions of subjects and time.

I wasn't crazy about this book but then I had to remember that I'm not in the age group it was directed at. It has an overall sense of moodiness and angst and I can see it resonating with people who need someone to understand the loneliness and awkwardness they are going through. If it weren't for the hard readability I would probably rate this book fairly well, but as such it was just average to me. If I happen to see them I'll check out some of his other work's as Lawrence does seem to be a talented writer. Hopefully I'll enjoy them more than I did this one.

The Lightkeeper's Daughter
Copyright 2002
246 pages

Review by M. Reynard 2010

It was an amazing, beautiful story. The characters were so alive, the plot was emotional, and overall it was great. A lot of it made me want to cry. Sad, but great.

I would highly recommend this to a mature teen. It was very good. It taught you about family and the importance of love.

Iain Lawrence does an excellent job of bringing his reader back and forth between what his main character Squid remembers as a child growing up on Lizzie Island and what she feels now, at the age of 17, as she returns to the island to see her parents after she went away to have the baby she became pregnant with at 13.
This book lets readers think about how they saw things as a child and how they realize how their thoughts and ideas have changed as an adult or even young adult as they follow Squid through this realization.
Lawrence's description of the island and the family that lives on this lonely island are captivating. You are instantly brought into a lightkeeper's life with his great imagery, and I thought once I could smell the salt in the air of my living room.
Even though this book was almost 250 pages, it was an easy and fast read that left me wanting to know what had really taken place on the island, what really happened to Squid's brother who mysteriously died before she left the island, and how her daughter, the baby girl she left the island to have, will react to this mysterious and lonely island, as well as her grandparents.

I tried to like this book, I really did. I read because it was the book of the month in my high school book club. it came recomented by our sister book club, i thought it was going to be good.

it started out all right. i thought the daughter who didn't talk was a little weird, but not that much. Squid, the mother, got on my neveres cause she acted like a child half the time, but at 17 she is a child. however, she sees herself grown up enough to raise a kid and get married. Squid's father annoyed me right off the bat and just went down hill from there. I swer if he said "ooouch" (or whatever it was he keep saying) one more time, i was going to burn the novel.

the main reason to read the book? to find out what happened to Alsitar, but even that wasn't all exciting. while the father takes the most blame, everyone except the mute daughter was at fault, even alsitar himself. the one person i liked in the book? squaid's mom. she seemed normal.

this book all has quiet a few plot holes, but i wont go over them here. Overall? a zero in my book.