The Effects of Light (Paperback)

~ (Author) "i step out of the car into dust..." (more)
Key Phrases: Kate Scott, New York, Samuel Blake (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Miranda Beverly-Whittemore's debut novel, The Effects of Light, is the story of Myla and Prudence (Pru) Wolfe, whose father David must raise them after they lose their mother in a tragic car accident. Helping David rear his daughters are a clan of academics, artists, and intellectuals, including photographer Ruth Handel, whose nude portraits of the girls become the centerpiece around which their lives unravel. Part mystery, part metaphor, part love story, and part philosophical treatise, The Effects of Light is an intriguing, yet perhaps overly ambitious first effort for this young author.

When we first meet Myla, she is Kate Scott, an East Coast academic who has seemingly wiped out all traces of her childhood. After a mysterious letter summons her home to Portland, Oregon, pieces of the tragedy that killed her sister and forced Myla to start her life anew start to surface, and the quest for truth begins. ("She was driving into this place, she was pushing into it, she would bore into it, find what she'd buried, and carry it into day.") Details from the past are told through the voice of Prudence, whose idyllic childhood grows more tumultuous as the photographs gain public attention and their innocence is called into question. Adding drama to the story is Myla's budding romance with colleague Samuel Blake, whose true intentions are called into question on more than one occasion.

Beverly-Whittemore has an obvious gift for describing raw human emotions, and at its best, The Effects of Light is a lyrical exploration of love, joy, forgiveness, and reconcilliation. However, when she launches into lengthy philosophical discussions about art history and the human condition, the novel steers off course. Once she tightens up her game a bit, we can look forward to many more captivating reads from this talented young writer. --Gisele Toueg --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Publishers Weekly

Beverly-Whittemore investigates the relationship between art and life in an engaging but uneven debut that reveals both her promise and her youth (she was born in 1976). As children, Myla Wolfe and her now deceased sister, Pru, posed for a series of provocative photographs. Because of an unnamed (but aggressively insinuated) tragedy, Myla has spent her adult life as a history professor named Kate Scott (though an unconvincing one: "So much passion over something so potentially boring: medieval research!... She felt lost in ideas"). A mysterious letter and a colleague's lecture draw her back to her hometown, where she tries to put together the puzzle of her dead father's academic work, reconnect with those she left behind, rediscover herself as Myla and forge a new love with the aforementioned colleague. Her quest is juxtaposed with the parallel narrative of the tragedy's buildup, as told by her dead sister. Beverly-Whittemore gets points for her ambitious plot, but a naïve intellectual enthusiasm overwhelms the novel, and in trying to incorporate too many heavy themes, she obscures the novel's focus: is this a mystery? an allegory? a graduate student essay? At one point, Myla recalls how her father congratulated her for refusing to learn to read yet, thus demonstrating that "she wasn't ready... to lose the big picture." Beverly-Whittemore doesn't seem ready to lose it, either—but next time, perhaps she'll exert more control over her far-reaching visions.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Grand Central Publishing (February 14, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0446696250
• ISBN-13: 978-0446696258
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.2 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (34 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #669,313 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A SPECTACULAR DEBUT: BRILLIANT, HEARTBREAKING, WISE, April 7, 2005

By	T. B. Eicher (New Haven) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Effects of Light (Hardcover)

THE EFFECTS OF LIGHT is a disarming, provocative book. Gorgeous prose, compelling characters, and a forceful plot keep the pages turning fast. All these elements should make for a really "easy read." Just sweep through the pages, weep at the ending, then move on in your life with a sense of pleasure, as one can do with so many well-written books these days. Sure, the tale is tragic -- it concerns the terrible death of a young girl and its devastating consequences on her older sister's life -- but Americans love their tragedy, both cushioned, as in THE LOVELY BONES, and stark, as in Marya Hornbacher's recently published THE CENTER OF WINTER. So why does this book linger and disturb so effectively?

The answer is simple, the implications complex. More than just a good story, THE EFFECTS OF LIGHT not only aspires to be, but also deftly becomes that rarity: a highly readable novel of ideas. This does not mean that the book simply presents smart people caught in the act of thinking. No, it requires the reader to join in on the thinking with tools provided -- sometimes a little awkwardly, but mostly quite matter-of-factly -- along the way. Multiple points of view abound. This is helpful, because the topic we are given to contemplate is a difficult one for many Americans to stomach. Can photographs of nude girl children ever be considered art? If we answer "Yes" to this question, knowing what we presumably know about the world, how do we protect both the art and the girls in the art? And what happens if we fail to protect them? What is our moral responsibility to our children and their constitutional freedoms? Who owns their bodies? Who gets to say?

As well as an extended meditation on the moral force of art, THE EFFECTS OF LIGHT is equally an exploration of what it means to be a good parent. Who is a good parent? Is it possible to be one if you are a distracted and brilliant widowed father who imbues his daughters with such a sense of self-confidence and well-being that they don't know how to fear the world sufficiently? That is one possible description of David Wolfe, the girls' father. Another would be this: a man who wants his daughters to feel the power of their own minds and voices as they learn to grow up in a community held together by optimism and a belief in the life of thought. David may seem foolish in his hope, but Beverly-Whittemore allows us to puzzle over whether such foolishness could ever be the source of such terrible tragedy. David bears no small resemblance to Atticus Finch in his idealistic assumption that people ought to be good. We should ask no less of them.

This is a beautifully structured novel, composed of two intertwined narrative strands, broken occasionally by single-page "Proofs," verbal depictions of single black and white photographic images. One of the narratives, a first person account by Prudence, the younger sister, allows us to watch as the tragedy unfolds; the second allows us to witness Myla, the big sister, as she scrambles to make sense of her past. Embedded in both narratives is the powerful voice of the charismatic, intellectual David as he speaks about what he loves almost as much as he loves his daughters: art, its history and promise. The structure of the novel echoes the life of this particular family: always intertwined, racing headlong through time, periodically and beautifully caught on film. Just as there is no way to stop the impending tragedy from coming, there is no way to make the book last longer than it lasts. Its rhythms take hold.

In this way, the book presents a brilliant inquiry into the nature of time and memory and the fabulous power of art both to transcend time and to redeem memory. These weighty intellectual insights are set against the passionate dailiness of the girls' lives. Writing directly about ideas as ideas, writing directly about the burden and salvation of the highly intellectual life is a challenge to a writer of any age. Most recently Elliot Perlman, a much older, more experienced writer, attempted it in SEVEN TYPES OF AMBIGUITY, a book that has garnered much praise. Equally praiseworthy is this debut. Read it and think. Read it and weep. It is beautiful.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Personal Journey of Re-discovery., May 20, 2005

By	Tyrone V. Banks (Newington, CT USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Effects of Light (Hardcover)

The Effects of Light is a personal story that invites the reader to explore the main characters past life through various passages and descriptions of photographs. The main character, Myla Wolfe, has reinvented herself for personal reasons and has been renamed Kate Scott. She receives a letter from her hometown in Portland, Oregon. She returns and all of the past events that she has struggled to push to the back of her psyche' reemerge.

Through additional dialogue provided by Myla's deceased sister Prudence Wolfe, we are privy to important details about the past that Myla/Kate has tried to forget. These details provide a firm foundation upon which Myla will act and react to as she re-discovers distant memories and tragic events.

There are many similarities shared between Myla and the Author Miranda Beverly-Whittemore. She is from an artistic background and some of her writing has a poetic edge that can be seen within her colorful descriptions. The Author has also worked as a model and that gives her a unique insight into the main character's descriptions of various photo shoot terminology. The aforementioned items add credibility to the story and provide a unique and believable viewpoint that we will share with Myla as she searches for the truth.

The Effects of Light is the debut work from an author with the ability to stimulate the senses through her artistic/poetic words and vivid imagery. It is both a mystery and a personal journey towards memories that have been pushed aside but in need of closure.

Reviewed by Tyrone Vincent Banks of Betsie's Literary Page.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A poignant, thought-provoking, and well-crafted debut novel, February 5, 2005

By	Bookreporter.com (New York, New York) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Effects of Light (Hardcover)

THE EFFECTS OF LIGHT is a luminous story --- part family drama, part mystery, and part rumination on the philosophy of art. Miranda Beverly-Whittemore combines these elements to create a poignant, thought-provoking, and well-crafted debut novel.

For more than a decade, Myla Rose Wolfe has been living under an assumed name. As Kate Scott, a medieval literature professor at a small, secluded East Coast college, she is free of the scandal associated with her family. But when she receives a package from a lawyer who's acting on behalf of an anonymous client, she realizes that no matter how far she runs, or how many details she fabricates about her life, she can't outrun her past. She heads home to Portland, Oregon, to relive the event that changed her family forever --- and to once again become Myla Wolfe.

In the first few pages of the book readers learn that Myla's father and 13-year-old sister, Pru, died within months of one another thirteen years ago, sending Myla into a tailspin of grief. The question of how they died is part of what fuels the narrative, and Beverly-Whittemore keeps the suspense heightened by parsing out details about what happened.

As children, Myla and Pru posed for family friend and photographer Ruth Handel. The photos --- taken over a period of ten years and some of which depict the young girls naked --- generated a national controversy about exploitation versus art. Myla and Pru's father, a brilliant, widowed college professor, was determined to instill in his daughters a sense of independence, and he allowed them to choose whether or not they wanted to be in Ruth's photographs. To the surprise of Myla and Pru, who enjoyed posing for the photographs and the sense of artistic accomplishment it gave them, the photos were viewed by some as child pornography.

Beverly-Whittemore makes interesting use of the photographs as a plot device, including sections called "proof" interspersed throughout the book. Each one describes a photograph of Myla and Pru, the circumstances of which are then revealed in the narrative. The story is propelled along through scenes set in the present as the reader follows Myla's quest to revisit her past, but the heart of the tale lies in the passages narrated by Pru. Reminiscent of THE LOVELY BONES, 13-year-old Pru tells her own story and is a vital presence in the novel. The events she recounts also shed light on Myla's character, their sisterly bond and the dynamics of the family.

If you pared THE EFFECTS OF LIGHT down to its basic elements, it still would be a compelling read with engaging characters and a suspenseful storyline. But Beverly-Whittemore doesn't stop there. Through contrasting images of light and dark, artist and audience, past and present, she has created a thinking-person's page-turner. The effect is truly remarkable...and dare I say enlightening?

--- Reviewed by Shannon McKenna