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Where the Light Gets In (Zoë Coyle, Ultimo) 

Many stories are woven into one in Zoë Coyle’s anticipated debut novel Where the Light Gets In. Delphi, a free-spirited artist with a poet’s soul, comes from a family broken apart by grief. Her father seems incapable of loving her, and her brother describes her as the ‘collateral damage’ of his severed relationship with their parents. Her mother, who suffers from a debilitating degenerative condition, is determined to set the terms of her death. When she summons Delphi to her home in Tasmania, telling her ‘it’s time’, Delphi sees it both as her responsibility and an opportunity to prove herself. But, despite her mother’s meticulous planning, everything goes wrong. Deep in the feelings of grief and guilt, Delphi sets off on a pilgrimage of self-discovery, one that takes her from her father’s disapproval to the too-welcoming arms of a cult in Italy as she attempts to find out what family means to her. The soul-searching artist’s journey is a familiar one, and Delphi’s hits all of the expected marks. The spiritual themes are laid on a bit thick at times as Delphi discovers herself through ritual, sex and self-deprecating sacrifice. But the characters that guide her are warm and forgiving, and there is a certain comfort in her predictably happy ending. Although Where the Light Gets In is overly ambitious at times, Coyle raises some pertinent questions around assisted dying and the relationships between children and their parents.  

Bec Kavanagh is a Melbourne writer and academic, and the schools programmer at the Wheeler Centre. 

 

Category: Reviews