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kcmg710's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
I absolutely loved this book. And it’s only 4* because I’m a sucker for happy endings. AND EVEN THOUGH I went into this aware that it probably wasn’t going to be a ‘proper happy ending’ I still got my hopes up and thought there was a chance that the ‘Truth would come out’ or they’d all reunite or something and of course I’m absolutely gutted that it didn’t. It’s completely my fault of course but idc I apologise to the author but I just cannot wholeheartedly give it a 5* because of this fact 😂🤦🏽♀️
I’ll be honest I’ve not given lighthouses, as a whole, too much thought. Eg; the interior of them, the challenges for the keepers and their families, the workload, the relief, free time ect. I just kinda assumed there’s the lighthouse and in them are probably just a ladder to get up to the top and every so often somebody would go and check on it. Which now with technology and stuff might be the case but this book just opened my mind completely.
I felt like a fly on the wall watching the keepers go about their day and I LOVED IT. I am super nosy and especially the little details l, I just absolutely lapped up because I want to know every single process/action/thought ect that a character might have/do. The little details are what matter to me (personally) as a reader and I thought Stonex did a great job of that.
The characters as a whole I’m so attached to them(except bill, f*ck bill 😑) even the ones I didn’t really get on with, at points my heart broke for them and I was like I get it that’s why they’re f*cked, I understand. They are so well written and again I’m nosy so I loved the snippets of backstories for them all (even with how heartbreaking some of them could be).
Again the only thing I hated was the fact that Arthur died thinking Helen didn’t love him anymore and was in love with scumbag Bill and that she majorly betrayed him (she kinda did but not at the level Jenny and Arthur were convinced of) She didn’t get the chance to explain to him and work things out.
I hate how unresolved it was. Even though I knew there could be a chance it would end that way, I still hate it. And I hate the fact that bill never got found out for the scumbag he was AND FRAMED MY ARTHUR!! Unforgivable. I appreciate he got instant karma but still.
I was also super confused about how ‘they never found any evidence’ when Bill literally wiped Arthur’s fingerprints on everything?! Unless they did and trident just covered it up? Like I know they covered up some things and wasn’t open to the public or the families and it kinda alluded to Arthur having something to do with it so in that case they must’ve found the evidence but idk. Maybe I didn’t read it properly but that’s the vibes I kinda got, that part felt abit ‘up in the air’ to me.
Also the part with the ghosts/voices ect. Was never really cleared up and half of me feel like that was maybe part of their imaginations or their guilt getting to them / kinda hallucinating because of the isolation on the tower ect. But the other half was like wait are there ghosts or what? Again with the ‘Silverman’ and ‘Sid’! Who the f*ck was SID? Are Sid and the Silverman the same person or what?
There were parts that made me laugh, parts that made me sob like a baby @1.30 in the morning 🫠, parts that I was freakeddd out about(the ghost children things) . It just felt like there was so much going on and I had no clue about any of it pretty much the whole time 😂. I was confused but it a comfy way is the only way I know how to describe it.
My reviews are not great I’ll be honest, I mostly just ramble and occasionally make a good point. But I’d definitely give this a go and I appreciate it if you got this far 🤍
I’ll be honest I’ve not given lighthouses, as a whole, too much thought. Eg; the interior of them, the challenges for the keepers and their families, the workload, the relief, free time ect. I just kinda assumed there’s the lighthouse and in them are probably just a ladder to get up to the top and every so often somebody would go and check on it. Which now with technology and stuff might be the case but this book just opened my mind completely.
I felt like a fly on the wall watching the keepers go about their day and I LOVED IT. I am super nosy and especially the little details l, I just absolutely lapped up because I want to know every single process/action/thought ect that a character might have/do. The little details are what matter to me (personally) as a reader and I thought Stonex did a great job of that.
The characters as a whole I’m so attached to them
I hate how unresolved it was. Even though I knew there could be a chance it would end that way, I still hate it. And I hate the fact that bill never got found out for the scumbag he was AND FRAMED MY ARTHUR!! Unforgivable. I appreciate he got instant karma but still.
I was also super confused about how ‘they never found any evidence’ when Bill literally wiped Arthur’s fingerprints on everything?! Unless they did and trident just covered it up? Like I know they covered up some things and wasn’t open to the public or the families and it kinda alluded to Arthur having something to do with it so in that case they must’ve found the evidence but idk. Maybe I didn’t read it properly but that’s the vibes I kinda got, that part felt abit ‘up in the air’ to me.
Also the part with the ghosts/voices ect. Was never really cleared up and half of me feel like that was maybe part of their imaginations or their guilt getting to them / kinda hallucinating because of the isolation on the tower ect. But the other half was like wait are there ghosts or what? Again with the ‘Silverman’ and ‘Sid’! Who the f*ck was SID? Are Sid and the Silverman the same person or what?
There were parts that made me laugh, parts that made me sob like a baby @1.30 in the morning 🫠, parts that I was freakeddd out about
My reviews are not great I’ll be honest, I mostly just ramble and occasionally make a good point. But I’d definitely give this a go and I appreciate it if you got this far 🤍
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Child death, and Murder
Moderate: Animal death, Death, Fire/Fire injury, Cursing, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Animal cruelty, and Blood
Minor: Vomit, Alcoholism, Death of parent, Emotional abuse, War, Dementia, Physical abuse, and Sexual harassment
laurataylor's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Murder, Pregnancy, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Blood, Child death, Death, Drug use, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Infidelity, and Physical abuse
sarah_bookshelf's review against another edition
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Very underwhelming; a ridiculously long-winded way of saying that people have secrets. I did enjoy the scenery descriptions, but with the plot progressing so slowly, it was hard to feel their impact. The audiobook was incredibly well narrated!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief and Child death
Moderate: Sexual harassment
Minor: Blood and Injury/Injury detail
chalkletters's review against another edition
challenging
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.25
When book club nominated a book with a lighthouse on the cover, obviously I had to vote for it! The Lamplighters actually has two covers, both with lighthouses, but which give wildly different ideas of what the book is going to be like, so I was curious to see which one would prove more accurate.
Like most of the lighthouse books on this blog, The Lamplighters is historical fiction, set when lighthouses were still manned rather than automatic, but it’s more recent than most, only going back to the 1970s. What also sets it apart is that it’s about a tower lighthouse, jutting directly out of the sea, where there isn’t space for keepers to bring their wives and families with them. Perhaps that was why it was difficult to keep the threads of the marriages straight. Arthur-and-Helen and Bill-and-Jenny merged into such a shapeless muddle that I had to make a note in my reading notebook which I referred back to every time there was a chapter from one of the wives’ perspectives.
Even after finishing The Lamplighters, it’s not entirely clear what happened in a couple of of the plots. Emma Stonex was clearly keeping information back from her readers, raising questions which you’d hope would be answered by the conclusion to the story. Except, several of them weren’t. Maybe it was intentional, because real life rarely offers neatly-wrapped solutions to every question, but in a novel billing itself as a mystery, it was more frustrating than thought-provoking.
Those plots which did feel complete were enjoyable, particularly the stories of those left behind: Jenny, Helen and the novelist Dan Martin. (Michelle, despite being the most distinct of the female characters, sadly got a bit abandoned.) Bill’s storyline could have been more effectively handled, because the bare bones of it were interesting.
There was certainly a lot going on in The Lamplighters, arguably too much because no single plot or detail really got the attention and weight that it deserved. Maybe a less complex structure would’ve delivered the story with more impact. While I’ll be keeping this for lighthouse reasons, I won’t necessarily be running out to buy more books by Emma Stonex, unless one catches my interest or comes highly recommended.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Murder
Moderate: Child death
Minor: Emotional abuse, Infidelity, and Blood
questingnotcoasting's review
dark
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
I was mainly drawn to this book because of the cover but luckily the plot also sounded intriguing. I often enjoy a dual timeline and I thought it worked well here as a way of gradually revealing details from the past. I enjoyed the atmospheric setting and there's some beautifully descriptive writing. So there were definitely some elements I really loved but there was also something holding me back from being fully invested which I can't put my finger on. Also a problem I often have with mystery books is finding the ending a little disappointing compared to what I've built up in my head. I did like the ending but I think I was just expecting a little more.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Grief, Murder, Violence, and Child death
Moderate: Animal death, Mental illness, and Animal cruelty
Minor: Rape
alyx_d's review against another edition
dark
hopeful
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cursing, Grief, Toxic relationship, and Child death
Moderate: Murder and Mental illness
Minor: Rape, Blood, Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, and Suicidal thoughts
mybookishhedgemaze's review against another edition
dark
informative
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
If I were rating this on the story alone, I'd probably give "The Lamplighters" 4/5 stars. As it is, three feels generous.
Aside from the contrived metaphors and similes...some so painfully forced I had to pause and laugh over them in disbelief or embarrassment, which destroyed any immersion the writer may have been trying to achieve...the over-used or ill-suited onomatopoeia, and the vague insinuations of supernatural influence or encounters, the gratuitous swearing was a literary turn-off. Using the infamous f-bomb as a noun, adjective, and verb isn't clever or original, it's actually the complete opposite and gives the distinct impression that the character or, more accurately, the *writer* is shockingly illiterate and at a loss for intelligent narrative.
Add to that the vast panoply of locker-room slang and insults, random and poorly executed stream-of-consciousness (or perhaps very well *executed* in an entirely different sense), senseless red herrings, bland, predictable plot twists, and the ever-changing character perspectives and metronomic swinging from decade to decade...all of this made for an impressively tiresome book. My Mum and I are thrilled to be done with it!
I *will* say that Arthur's poem was hauntingly lovely, but that's all I really can say.
Aside from the contrived metaphors and similes...some so painfully forced I had to pause and laugh over them in disbelief or embarrassment, which destroyed any immersion the writer may have been trying to achieve...the over-used or ill-suited onomatopoeia, and the vague insinuations of supernatural influence or encounters, the gratuitous swearing was a literary turn-off. Using the infamous f-bomb as a noun, adjective, and verb isn't clever or original, it's actually the complete opposite and gives the distinct impression that the character or, more accurately, the *writer* is shockingly illiterate and at a loss for intelligent narrative.
Add to that the vast panoply of locker-room slang and insults, random and poorly executed stream-of-consciousness (or perhaps very well *executed* in an entirely different sense), senseless red herrings, bland, predictable plot twists, and the ever-changing character perspectives and metronomic swinging from decade to decade...all of this made for an impressively tiresome book. My Mum and I are thrilled to be done with it!
I *will* say that Arthur's poem was hauntingly lovely, but that's all I really can say.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Infidelity, Murder, Mental illness, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Toxic friendship, Toxic relationship, Violence, Death, Child death, Child abuse, Bullying, Blood, Animal death, Animal cruelty, and Pedophilia
acascadeofbooks's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death
Moderate: Death
Minor: Blood
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