What readers think of The Light Between Oceans, plus links to write your own review.

A good book transports you to a different time and place; better books stay with you long after you've turned the last page. "The Light Between Oceans," does both. Quiet controlled prose creates a sense of time and place inhabited by real people. There are no heroes or villains. Just regular folk who have to live with the consequences of their decisions in a world that is after all never fair. The reader's notion of right and wrong is challenged in circumstances where there are no easy answers. An engrossing read. While you want to know what happens to the main characters, you don't want the book to end. A stunning debut novel.

This book begins with such promise! The first section is beautifully detailed with evocative descriptions of wild landscape and harsh weather; the author clearly has a gift for this kind of writing. However, her attention to detail slows down the story and overloads the narrative with details about the workings of a lighthouse that were interesting at first but ultimately became rather tiresome. The characters are engaging but not complex; a more nuanced exploration of the characters would have made the plot less predictable. The book is a good choice for those who like more romance than drama but for me, it was too much of a tearjerker.

Lighthouse, island and characters become alive with detailed descriptions given us by the author, M.L. Stedman. Duty and love meet moral challenges with the clash of cymbals. This is a love story gone awry because of love itself.
I could not put the book down, not because like within a mystery one searches for the solution, but because there is no solution to this moral drama..but you are compelled to watch it -like a car wreck.

It is always a pleasure to read not only a good story, but one that is so well written. The author has a gift with words and I was sad to see the novel come to an end. The book was filled with wonderful descriptive writing, symbolism, and an element of not ever quite knowing what would turn up next. Put all that together, and you have a great read. The book has many topics that would make a great discussion for a book club. Great first novel!

This is a very haunting and well written book. The author does a wonderful job of describing the locations and the characters, both of which are essential to the story. The story is about how one bad choice made by good people can change many lives. I will remember the characters and the moral dilemmas they faced for a long time.
After finishing the book I wanted to share it with a friend. It is the kind of book you want to discuss with others, making it a good choice for Book Clubs.

I sincerely enjoyed this debut novel by M.L. Stedman. A childless couple living on a remote island find a crying infant in the arms of her dead father. The novel becomes a struggle not between good and evil, but something much harder to clarify and define - like two varying shades of gray that deepened as the story developed. I loved Tom and his staunch refusal to pretend that his actions (and Isabel's) did not have consequences - at least for someone. I enjoyed the imagery of Janus as well. This is one of the best debut novels I've read in a long time and appreciated how the novel forced me to reflect what my own actions would have been in similar circumstances.

The opening line to this soul-searching first novel by M.L. Stedman begins, “On the day of the miracle, Isabel was kneeling at the cliff’s edge, tending the small, newly made driftwood cross. Questions come to mind immediately, why is Isabel tending the small, new driftwood cross? Why was the cross there? What could the miracle possibly be? Stedman, who was born in Australia, pulls you into the lives of Tom and Isabel Sherbourne, who have chosen to live a solitary life on the tiny island of Janus Rock, off the coast of Australia, where Tom tends the lighthouse.

The story of each person unfolds around a very difficult moral question. You, the reader, must decide what would you do, and do you agree with Tom and Isabel’s decision? How will their decisions affect other people around them? Are they ready for the consequences of the decisions they made in life? Stedman gives you enough background information about the main characters that allows you to build an understanding of who they are, and what experiences they have lived through that formed the choices they made.

I loved how the story created strong feelings of dread, fear, shame, anger, anxiety, sympathy, sadness, relief as you moved forward in time. I was rooting for Isabel even when I knew I would not do that in real life. The conclusion allows you to see how the choices each person made changed their lives forever. There is so many outstanding topics for the people in your book group to discuss that you will find the meeting will run late.

This is a spellbinding story that I could not put down. I was pulled into the story and brought to tears on several occasions. I think the author did a masterful job of portraying the circumstances in such a way that I could sympathize with and almost support the decisions the Sherbournes make, almost making me believe that they have done the right thing. It is only when I distanced myself from the spell of the place and the characters that I could awake to the reality of what was done. It is a story that really left me wondering what I would have done in their place.