Wild Light: A printmaker’s day and night

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Thank you so much Jeff Zentner for writing this gorgeous story!! I’m still in awe... And everyone reading this review, even if you normally don’t read YA: please read this brilliant gem of a book! In the dim of the porch light I see his eyes, ardent with furious love. It burns through the darkness in me. It pulls me from the maelstrom and drops me, dripping and shivering on the shore. Come inside an enchanting world where you’ll discover the secret life of the Zoo at night! You’ll be greeted by a Wizard and presented with a choice of three pathways to explore first. From there, you’ll be transported to lands of magic and wonder, with fairies mythical creatures, multi-coloured animals and even a candyland, all lit up as beautiful silk lanterns. Delaney is a genius, she has discovered a mold in a cave and it has huge potential as a pharmaceutical, she's been offered a full scholarship in one of the most successful colleges around. She says she will only take it if her best friend Cash can come too on an equivalent scholarship. But leaving his grandparents, the life he thought he was going to have, but, which is unfulfilling is a huge step for Cash. He is torn and tortured by his decision to go.

I initially intended to read this book over several days, and I even put it down a couple of times intending to call it a night. But the book kept calling me and so here I sit after midnight just soaking in this book. Sometimes a book just speaks to you and for me, this was one of those. It turned out that a boarding school book was how this story wanted to be told. There’s a particular sort of magnetism that the boarding school story has for a particular sort of person. I’m one of these people. As a kid I dreamed of a place where my love of learning was a social asset, rather than a liability. I imagined a refuge, away from parents and bullies, where I could go to be the person I really wanted to be. Naturally, I’ve always been drawn to boarding school stories for this reason. When I started writing books, I promised myself I’d write one someday. Because there’s something else I love that I left for the end: learning that you’re more than you ever thought you could be, and that your life has greater treasures laid up for you than you could ever imagine.I have confirmed a new quirk of mine. When I finish a really good book, I clap my hands as if I just watched a performance… and boy did I clap my hands for this! this is the kind of story that gently touches you and the feeling spreads right to your very core. its a story of loss and new opportunities, of the homes that create us and that distant places that refine us, of peaceful waters and contentious anxiety, of best friends and family, of the healing power of words and finding the beauty in struggles. This is one of those YA books that more adults than "YA's" will embrace. Why? Not much on plot, the lifeblood of popular YA fare. It's aces on writing style and characterization, though, and it's what they call "sweet" in that the characters are so nice you want to believe they exist. And although it walks the property line of Hallmark Channel Lit., it never quite crosses it, for which we are grateful. My love for Zentner’s books has no bounds. I know several things will happen when I read a Jeff Zentner book.

This was just excellent! Zentner is one of my absolute favorite YA authors, and this book was another reminder why.

I hope you enjoy this journey through 24 hours of my collected memories of the nature that surrounds me.” Bogs a bit in the middle and the ending's predictable, but still, did I mention how sweet and all-American these kids are? You'll want to adopt them -- and their poetry teacher practically does (I guess you can get away with this in private schools, but have my doubts). This was way too pure for me. I really really loved it. It was still hard to rate because I did have some issues, but I still felt it deserved 5 stars. The poems were so good, and some parts that were not poems still felt like reading poetry. It perfectly encapsulates what it feels like to be the outsider. What it feels like to be lost. To love. To grieve. To heal. Not only does Mundy have a way with words but she also creates characters that are very real and full of complexities. Be it main protagonist or minor supporting character, I could easily relate to them or know of someone just like them.

Wild Light’s breathtaking photography is accompanied by Erik's often thought-provoking and lyrical observations. In the great tradition of naturalist John Muir, Erik highlights the paradox of wilderness and its ability to invite us deeper into what makes us human. A perfect stand of fall aspen or the unblinking eyes of a mule deer call forth both awe and reflection. A poignant coming-of-age novel about two best friends whose friendship is tested when they get the opportunity to leave their impoverished small town for an elite prep school. For fans of Looking for Alaska. Delaney and Cash shared a deep, deep bond. They both experienced trauma related to their mothers’ drug addiction, and because of that, they had a bone-deep understanding of each other. Cash was fortunate to have the endless love and support of his grandparents, and they doled that love out just as equally to Delaney. I also had great fondness for the bromance between Alex and Cash. Their friendship was a beautiful thing. They suffered through crew together, ironed together, and were known to hug it out when necessary. It was a pleasure seeing that friendship grow and flourish. This book is about everything I just mentioned, but it’s about something else. In the words of one of my characters: With profound, evocative prose and lyrical insights into the world surrounding a struggling main character, Zentner’s powerful, emotional novel is one you won’t soon forget.” — BuzzfeedFor example, not only did I recognize pieces of Cash and Delaney: the two HS best friends that In The Wild Light swirls around, but I absolutely knew Cash’s papaw and mamaw - the grandparents who raised Cash after his mother died of a drug overdose and who nearly end up raising Delaney as her mother battles the same addiction. Like a lot of small, rural communities Sawyer, Tennessee is being devoured by drugs. The opioid crisis has swallowed both Cash and Delaney’s parents, and is threatening to destroy them as well, when suddenly, and remarkably, everything changes. You can’t fix a car with poetry. “Poetry won’t help you build that new app and make billions. It won’t win you an election. There are so many ways that poetry isn’t useful in the way we think of things as being useful. And yet…We bring poems to read at weddings and funerals. We write them to lovers. When our lives have been burned down around us, we look for that single glowing ember remaining, and that’s a poem. Poetry is one of the highest artistic achievements of humankind.”