The Lighthouse Road: A Novel

Slightly confusing in switching back and forth between timelines, characters.
Was interested in the portrayals of the Lake Superior setting. (Minnesota, but of course, comparable to northern MI and UP)
Read reviews to get concepts of the story.
Complex human beings on the pages again.
A worthwhile read. ( )

The Lighthouse Road is the story of Thea, a young immigrant girl who speaks no English and is alone in America, and her son, Odd.

The prose is beautiful and descriptive – I felt as if I could have looked up from the book and found myself in the woods of northern Minnesota or on the frozen shores of Lake Superior. The book takes place in pretty much two time periods -1896, when young Thea arrives in Gunflint from Norway and begins work at a lumber camp, and 1920, as we follow Thea’s son, Odd, on his quest to build a life for himself as a fisherman and boat builder. The story is not told in linear style but each chapter is named with the month and year so it’s easy to know, even before you start a chapter, where you are in the story. I liked the non-chronological storytelling and the way bits and pieces of the story were slowly revealed. The only part of the book I didn’t like going back to was the story of Odd and Rebekah. It just didn’t grab me like the rest of the book and their relationship seemed too insular. Where there really no other, perhaps more appropriate, companions for either of them?

This is Peter Geye’s second novel, the first being Safe From the Sea, which I loved. I liked The Lighthouse Road, too, just not quite as much. So I’d recommend starting with Safe From the Sea, and then when you’re hungry for more from this talented author, The Lighthouse Road will certainly fit the bill. 4.3 stars. ( )

I have carefully read some of the 4 and 5 star reviews for this book in the attempt to find whatever I missed and the only conclusion I came to is that this book must have gone way over my head. I thought the storyline had potential but it really lacked continuity and I thought the ending was weak and dissapointing. I guess this one just didn't click for me. ( )

Like many of my recent submissions this was a GoodReads giveaway. Unlike many of my recent submissions this book is wonderfully and carefully crafted not only in language but also in storyline.

Previous reviewers have complained that the timelines in this book are too complexly intertwined and hard to follow and while I will admit that there is a lot going on, the book very handily states the month and date of each chapter in the page heading. Any reader finding themselves confused can merely consult the top of the page and remember a few key dates. This weaving in and out of history adds great suspense to the whole narrative in a way that would have been difficult to achieve with a straightforward telling. I congratulate the author for having the courage to trust his readers to follow him on his tale just as he presented it. It must be admitted, however, that this will make the movie adaptation a bit more complex should it come to pass.

In summary, Geye's story is a complex one but a wonderfully fulfilling one. His use of language is exceptionally rare in a modern novel intended for a mass audience. It is a treat not only for those who love a complex and engaging storyline but also for those who find the occasional need to drag out a dictionary quite pleasurable. ( )

A couple of years ago, I read the magnificent novel Safe From the Sea by Peter Geye. Since that time, I've tried to push it on each and every person I know who reads, no matter how infrequently and even if the only thing they ever read willingly is the length of a text message. Frankly, if you're reading this now without having read that book, go find it and come back here when you've finished! It's that wonderful. So when I heard that Geye's second novel, The Lighthouse Road, was being released, I couldn't wait to get my hands on it.

Set in the north woods outside of Duluth, MN both in the late 1890s and the early 1920s, this is the tale of immigrant Thea Eide, a young Norwegian woman who came over to the US to join her uncle and aunt on their farm but instead ends up as a cook at a logging camp, and her son Odd, a fisherman, boat builder, and rum runner in the still remote outpost. Thea and Odd's tales, set some twenty years apart, alternate and intertwine with the story of Hosea Grimm, the local apothecary who delivers Odd, and his daughter Rebekah.

Thea speaks no English when she arrives in Gunflint and finds herself without resources. She takes a job cooking at the lumber camp in order to make it through the winter but she is completely isolated there. The camp's remoteness, her position there, her sex, and her inability to speak the language all serve to keep her alone and friendless in this harsh new environment. There is a frozen brutalness and an uncaring, almost desperate force to the winter in the camp, a winter when even the wolves in the surrounding wilderness are starving and desperate enough to venture close to human habitation. And in the cold, bleak, dark days of such a winter, Thea will find herself giving birth to Odd, the tiny baby boy around whom she wraps her very being. Despite her fierce maternal clutching, Thea lives but a short time, leaving Odd an orphan to be raised by Hosea and Rebekah.

Odd's strange childhood in the apothecary's home, always just outside the unspoken and unacknowledged secrets permeating the house, served to make him quiet and generally solitary although he forges an unbreakable friendship with a native local boy, Danny, and falls in love with the only woman he should never crave. However, it is only by escaping Gunflint that Odd will ever have a chance to move forward. So he builds a magnificent boat forged from sweat and heat and love in order to carry him and his love to a new life. But the ties that bind Odd to Gunflint and its damaged and eccentric inhabitants are tight and cannot be thrown off. The past is always within him, pulling him backwards, and reminding him of the debt owed others.

Geye has written another affecting and atmospheric novel, an epic of secrecy, loneliness, isolation and the need for and power of love and connection. The novel is very Scandinavian in feel and although not lengthy, it is best compared to stark Norse sagas. The landscape itself and sense of place is dramatic and the winters described are lowering and oppressive and set the tone for the book as a whole. The characters are all flawed, trapped by their circumstances and their festering secrets, damaged and aching. They are unable and unwilling to escape their pasts to create something better, instead bequeathing their own silence and easy deceit to the next generation. This is a stunningly written novel with each element blending seamlessly together to form a well-crafted and potent, if desolate tale. ( )