Thank you to NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for the eARC!

In Days of Light, we follow our main character Ivy across 6 days throughout different decades, starting in 1938 and always occurring in April. The first 2 days take place around Easter 1938, and those 2 days set the trajectory of Ivy’s path, showing how tragedy can shape you for the rest of your life.

I loved the reflections on grief and longing! I also enjoyed Ivy’s introspective ruminations on not always feeling like a person and questioning who you’re meant to be/what you should be doing in life.

This character driven novel was beautifully written; it felt quiet and, at times, claustrophobic.

While I was initially pulled in by the novel, it really loses momentum around day 3 or 4. I began to feel bored and struggling to stay connected, especially as the story went in a confusing direction. It also felt as if Ivy’s development stilted and we only got to know so much about her (despite staying with her the entire time and being in her head).

The book had so much potential and started off strong but lost me along the way, ending with a not so satisfying story. I felt similarly about The End We Start From so I’m unsure if it’s worth reading more from Hunter or if her storytelling just isn’t for me.

Rating: 3.5 stars

Days of Light by Megan Hunter

Book review. 4*

The book begins on Easter Sunday, 1938. Ivy lives with her unconventional family at Cressingdon. Events on that day and the days that follow shape Ivy's life from then on.

The novel covers Ivy's life from that day until her approaching death through marriage, love, death,a life of religion and dedication and back to love again, all the while with her brother, Joseph a presence in her mind. Light and the power of light is also a main theme.

I really enjoyed following Ivy's life and her different relationships throughout the book. I liked the characters in the book and the subtle descriptions of them and their lives.

A lovely gentle read.

I give the book 4*

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher, Grove Atlantic, for the ARC e-book of Days of Light in return for an open and honest review of the book.

Ivy is 19 in 1938 when the book opens. She's the daughter of a Bohemian British family with beloved older brother, Joseph. Unlike everyone else in her family, Ivy has little ambition and believes she has little talent. A tragedy on Easter Sunday is destined to impact Ivy for the rest of her life. The book follows her on a series of days throughout the rest of her life.

For the most part, I would describe the writing in this book as ethereal, making it difficult to get a clear understanding of Ivy or the circumstances of her life. There are religious undertones that emanate from the tragedy and impact Ivy's life choices, but it's never clear just what she believes and exactly what happened on the day of the tragedy. This is a short book that felt long.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

What a wonderful story! So beautifully written, so tender and bright, and honest, and human.
Ivy's story moves through eras and decades, hardships and happiness. Seeing her character 'living' at last when she thought she didn't know how to live was so bittersweet.

The only thing I didn't enjoy was the parts about religion and faith in the end. I know it was important for the character, but I didn't really connect with it.

Thank you NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for this ARC.

a novel like falling asleep in the bath, like reading messages from someone you used to love, like growing out of old clothes. Days of Light is about Easter, a series of them, across the decades from the 30s to the 90s, as Ivy suffers a terrible loss that follows her throughout her life. we see her at 19 in an idyllic country house, like the setting of The Go-Between; surviving the Blitz as a young mother; joining a convent in search of a light she’s always felt. throughout the years, she falls in and out of touch with Frances, her older brother’s university girlfriend.

the novel is preoccupied with grief, but also love: from family, romantically, and unexpectedly, never blaming partners we might judge but instead trying to find meaning. Ivy is a drifting narrator who struggles to admit what she wants, but the novel is so poetic that this doesn’t slow it down. a really lovely, short read that feels like the oil painting on its cover.

i was sent a review copy by NetGalley.

Days of Light by Megan Hunter is a beautiful, lyrically written book. This novel tells the story of Ivy over the course of several days following an unexpected tragedy. It explores the long range consequences and human struggle with tragedy and grief. This is also a hopeful book and one that will stay with me. Megan Hunter is sure to be an auto-buy author for I simply love her writing. It is poetic yet accessible and it is haunting yet hopeful. Thank you to NetGalley for the advanced reading copy.

Lyrical, haunting, and deeply intimate, Days of Light explores motherhood, survival, and love in the quiet aftermath of crisis. Megan Hunter’s sparse, poetic prose captures the small, beautiful moments that persist even in the darkest times. A meditative and atmospheric novel that lingers long after the last page.

The overall was interesting but it didn't work for me in the long run. I felt that many topics were covered unnecessarily.

This book has become quite a discovery to me, and I can now say after having finished that it is one of my favourite books. When it first started with the disappearance of Joseph I didn’t know what to expect from it, what direction was the book going to follow, and when everything started to unravel, I started feeling increasingly attached to the book. The characters were sublime in my opinion, and I loved both Ivy and Frances as their lives were evolving. I find this book a perfect narration of the human condition and the constant attempts at trying to find a place in a world that keeps evolving.

This story is about Ivy, her family and spanned across six decades, starting at Easter 1938.

I am sorry to say that I just couldn't seem to totalling engage with the storyline and tried on a few occasions to continue.

I am sure that others will love this book, but unfortunately it wasn't for me.

this book follows a main character Ivy and how one night changes her future forever. we then visit her on interim over the next few decades. we begin with Ivy and her family living in the countryside. she is 19 years old at this point. and we follow her right towards the end of her life. all the events in Ivy's life follow the many changes that happen in the world. and it was interesting to get a zoomed in view of another person. as after all we only ever know this much depth of a life when we think of our own. so to follow someone through the ages we all hit and see the difference was really interesting. obviously i wasnt in the war years though! so this again held my interest. we also see her marry and then divorce.
i was completely capture bu this story. Megan's writing held me all the way through, and it felt like i was learning of a family members story.
there are diaries now that span many years and you simply put a small input into each day. then you can go back and see over many years the differences. this felt a lot like that and i really enjoyed it.

I saw a review that described Days of Light as One Day as if done by Virginia Woolf, and I think in some ways this is a very apt description of Huner’s novel. The story is character driven, very interior. The prose is very easy to get lost in, allowing the reader to really immerse themselves in Ivy’s experiences. Hunter succeeds at creating very evocative, memorable scenes which is really important given the narrow scope of the novel, which attempts to construct a life and history through six days.

Thematically Days of Light ventured in directions that I didn’t expect, and while I didn’t necessarily connect with some of the spiritual elements of the text, I valued much of what it had to say about life and our inner selves. With Ivy as a perfectly sympathetic vehicle the story explores how loss and grief can so fundamentally shape our lives, our thought processes, our joys and triumphs. Marina, Angus, Bear, Joseph, and Frances were all so interesting and I desperately wish I had been able to spend more time with them. A very lovely read

Days of Light had me interested but also not fully immersed in Ivy's world. While the writing was unique in following her life over six days, and decades. I found it a bit hard to follow and found myself going back to the book jacket for clarification when it changed "days". This one is a 3star for me I wanted to enjoy and there were lessons imbedded that I did, the way the story was told fell flat for me.

Thank you to NetGalley and Grove Press for the advanced reader copy

I liked the way the book explored six decades following the tragedy at the start. The writing was very detailed—sometimes a little too slow for me—although I appreciated its lyrical and thought-provoking style. I also enjoyed how the different relationships were explored, and how the impact of that single 'day' affected and 'lived' with them. I received an ARC from NetGalley and this is my honest review.

This was captivating from the very first page. I found the writing style beautiful with many great quotes, the descriptive writing fit the atmosphere of the book very well. It was not until about 70 % through that this started going down hill for me. I think that the amount of religious thoughts and references that were thrown in at the start were fine, it gave the character's some personality and fit the historical timeline well. But when Ivy decided to become a nun and everything suddenly was about god, jesus and heaven the book completely lost me. I thought that it was very out of character and didn't add any excitement to the story. I don't like when books try to force a specific religious belief on the reader, and it felt like this book was doing that as her being a nun didn't add anything else to the story. For that reason this is only a two star for me, and I think there need to be some kind of warning in the blurb that this has so much religion in it as i wouldn't have picked it up if i knew.

well-written. be warned, there are a LOT of religious musings here. like, a LOT. but, still i found it really well-written, taut and singing with the emotions of the characters. 4 stars. tysm for the arc.

Days of Light is a beautiful written novel from the opening moments when we meet Ivy languidly living her life a teenager admits her family.The shocking incident had me gasping out loud.We follow Ivy through the rest of her life from girlhood to old age.So lyrical so moving just loved this story.#netgalley #groveatlantic

It might be too on the nose to describe Days of Light as luminous, but there is no better word to describe this quietly exquisite novel. In the first section of the book, Hunter lulls readers into a sense of complacency with a story that feels classic and familiar, but as Ivy's story evolves across the decades, the book makes turn after turn that feel both surprising and inevitable. I loved every page.

🌅 Book Review - Days of Light by Megan Hunter 🌅

Days of Light begins on Easter Sunday in 1938, where 19-year old Ivy and her bohemian family gather to celebrate the holiday in their sprawling English countryside house. But the day ends in tragedy, and the rest of the novel follows Ivy over the same day in six different episodes throughout her life, as she tries to deal with her guilt.

The novel is an interior landscape of Ivy, as she moves throughout her life, and deals with themes of religion and God, love, spirituality, the afterlife, art, but especially the notion of belonging and meaning.

The writing is very literary and poetic, and Hunter provides a rich interior character landscape.
I absolutely saw this as a movie, and think it would be such a great film due to the richness of the character study, especially Marina, Ivy's mother.

If you want something literary and more on the character-driven over plot-driven side of things, this is a great book!

This is a beautifully written book set over six pivotal days in Ivy’s life. It’s set over a period of sixty years from 1938 to 1999, with a chapter for each of those crucial days in her life. Somehow the author very cleverly manages to capture Ivy’s entire life in those six chapters. The book drew me in from the very start and I was invested in Ivy throughout, wanting to find out how her life would play out. This is a gem of a book and I’ll be very surprised if this doesn’t make this year’s Booker Prize list.