“Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”
After her dad has a mental breakdown and her mom takes off, seventeen-year-old Lucille is left to pay the bills and take care of her eleven-year-old sister, Wren. While her home life could never have been called perfect, this situation brings on a level of responsibility that is incredibly overwhelming. Lucille does not know if her mom will come back and fears that if anyone finds out about her situation, they will end up in the foster system and she may be separated from her sister. With her future as uncertain as ever she does everything she can to take care of little Wren and keep them together. In the midst of all this she finds her feelings for her best friend Eden’s brother Digby growing, which adds to the confusion and challenge of her situation.
This Raging Light is a heartbreaking story that deals with a lot of really difficult issues. The writing is well done and does a great job of giving us Lucille’s perspective, where we get to experience everything through her point of view. I really felt for her and the unfortunate circumstances that surrounded her. She is a strong character who you truly root for, and her relationship with her sister is very sweet and endearing. There are many aspects of this book that work beautifully, however there are two problems I had that took me out of the story. Those would be the characters of Eden and Digby. As the best friend (Eden) and the love interest (Digby), I found them to be surprisingly unlikable. Their actions and general behavior, which started out as helpful, ended up coming across as selfish as the story progressed. Unfortunately they are important characters and it’s not something I was able to disregard. It is an emotional story with a lot of promise that for me just didn’t come together.
*ARC provided by NetGalley. Publication date: December 22, 2015.
About a Book 
I agree that This Raging Light has lots of promise—it also didn’t come together for me. Digby was really, really unlikeable as a love interest, especially with the cheating. I felt like if only we had been shown more of what he’s like more than told, maybe he’ll be more likeable? I’m not entirely sure.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think you’re absolutely right. We aren’t really shown who Digby is and the little that we know about him is not exactly endearing. It’s really too bad because there are so many other aspects of the book that work really well.
LikeLike