Book review: “We Are The Light” is set at our town’s movie theater

Not often does our square-mile town receive attention, but the latest book “We Are The Light” from Matthew Quick is set at our historic Ambler Theater and there’s a tragedy in the movie theater when the story begins.

Background

I’m primarily a non-fiction guy. However, the fact that the slightly PhotoShopped movie theater cover photo of this book is something I drive by roughly every day of my life. And, my wife Theresa picked up a signed copy for me when the author Quick lectured about this new novel at our town’s Ambler Theater. So, I had to give the book a try.

As you can see, Quick, author of Silver Linings Playbook is no pushover. “We Are the Light” touches on a lot of the same themes as SLP. Specifically, finding mental and physical bedrock when the senses and the mind aren’t playing fair.

Plot

The plot is hard to describe without spoilers. But the gist is that there has been a bloody tragedy in town and the main character “Goodgame” (whose name I hate, but whatever, Dickens played with names, too) is a wreck thereafter.

The story chronicles his journey of coping with what he experienced. It reads fast.

It’s obvious the author has experience with these kinds of…I hesitate to say “psychotic”…breaks. But breaks nonetheless, and he’s writing from experience.

My review

I found it hard to suspend my disbelief as much as I needed to.

As I poured through ‘We Are the Light,” I felt real emotion for the characters. And the subject matter is so, um, broad that one of the only ways to get a handle on it is gernalizing it, perhaps fiction’s greatest super power.

Tough subject matter. Struggling people. Fast read.

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