56 Books Like The Light We Lost

Many heroic characters are not flashy. This is the way I like to cast them in my novels. The principal characters in this fast-moving SiFi novel are that way. The story is revealed using a first-person approach, each chapter being in the voice of a particular character. I like the breezy nature of the dialog that allows emotional depth to gradually make an impact without getting bogged down in psychoanalysis. While the earth is frosting over with a new ice age and civilization grinds towards an uncertain future, national alliances are forming with the associated grasping and competition for limited resources. A genius scientist is tasked to find an answer and the author rightly avoids a deep dive, instead taking broad leaps across technological chasms. However, this novel gets you thinking about what you might do under similar circumstances.

This book is relevant today. Our country is going through the turmoil of distress caused by the breakdown of civil order and the looming scarcity of basic necessities like energy, food, and water. The scenario here is about the intersection of several groups of people and how well they prepared for surviving the first several days of a catastrophic event. There is good survival preparation information embedded in the text that can be augmented by the many real survivalist organizations. In crafting the story, the author does the same thing I do…layering useful, real-world information into the fictional narrative. Another real-world question is considered here. If there were no police, National Guard, FEMA, or aid groups, what would you be able to do for you and your family? The message in this book leaves us hopeful. 

In my novels, the quiet depth of character development runs parallel to the action. This is the only way to make fighting for one's life mean anything. Shootings, explosions, high body counts, or a countdown to chaos may hold momentary interest but will not create any lasting memory or take-away useful in real life.  This story spends quite a lot of time on backstory and the emotional well from which the main characters spring. Some might desire a quicker path through this. Some might not. And quite a few false paths are developed as you’d expect in a who-done-it type novel. The story reaches a driving and satisfying conclusion but some might leave wondering about the author’s opinion of law enforcement as is spoken through her protagonist.

I like to write stories where the protagonist is thrown into situations where they don’t know the extent of what they don’t know. This requires the character to be creative, courageous, and if they can, fearless or at least grow into this state of being. This is the exact case in Executive. The arc of the lead character grows from timid to confident over some twists and turns as malicious corporate personalities exert their influence over her. She slowly begins to realize her own power. The blend of real-world high-tech military hardware development provides a steady and interesting backdrop for the increasingly hostile life and death office politics. The story resolves as you’d expect so there is not a great moment of surprise revelation, but it is satisfying.

This book is the story of four teenagers desperate to escape the mining towns of Ishpeming and Negaunee but doomed to immersion in the violence simmering just beneath the surface.

Riekki did a good job of instilling a sense of impending doom from the opening pages, and I couldn’t put it down. It showed me a side of the UP I didn’t know existed, one beyond the beauty of the peninsula, shining a light on the dirty underbelly of mining—what it offers and what it leaves behind—the cavings—underground passages left by the mining company. Riekki’s description of the bottomless pit in the woods is Poe creepy.

Physically and emotionally brutalized, these four characters—angst-filled Craig; J., never touched by a woman; Antony, with the walls he puts up; and Hollow, determined to escape, are a downtrodden, culturally isolated group. I rooted for them and recognized them as characters that can be… show more.

Can you imagine losing your entire family to a plane accident? That’s what the heroine of this first-in-a-series book by Colleen Coble has to deal with.

With so many unanswered questions, Bree Nichols puts her K-9 search-and-rescue skills to work, looking for the bodies of her husband and son in the wilderness of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Having been widowed young, my heart went out to her from the start.

Working with Park Ranger Kade Mathews, Bree stumbles upon a terrible crime that may be linked to the plane crash. I think this book speaks to the importance of never giving up on faith and hope, even when everything looks absolutely bleak.

The best thing about Ms. Coble’s books is her character development. The pacing is less of a thriller than a cozy mystery with a good dose of romance. While lacking a military hero, I do like that there is… show more.

I love the poems in this book, which are all about shipwrecks on the Great Lakes. I was drawn in by the writing itself, which is specific and imagistic. The author does a really good job of imagining the lives of people who worked on these ships.

One of the things I remember most is the description of the various cargoes—peaches, Christmas trees, logs—not to mention the description of a boiler that explodes and crashes through the roof of a funeral home during a funeral. I never realized there were so many ships at the bottom of these lakes. Even reading about such tragedies, I couldn’t help but notice how beautiful Morgan’s writing is.

This book appealed to me because of its strong central character, Helena, who’s carrying around a big secret. Let’s face it—we all have secrets. But most of our secrets are comparatively minor. Helena’s is anything but. Helena’s past is complicated, which makes the plot complicated, just the way I like plots, but the book is still easy enough to follow.

I was interested to see how Helena appreciated some aspects of her past life, even if most people would consider her present life much better. I kept wanting to know more about this imagined place in the U.P., which seemed so strange even though it’s not that far from St. Ignace or Sault Ste. Marie or even the Mackinaw Bridge. 

What if the end of the world was the best day of your life? This intriguing premise drew me in, but it was the characters that kept me hooked through all seven books of this series.

Focused on a small town in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula after an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) devastates America, the series is packed with characters who feel like real people, with relatable struggles and flaws. I was rooting for them as they fought to hold their town together against an onslaught of threats.

This is a very encouraging graphic novel for anyone who thinks that their voice and concerns about Nature's protection aren't being heard.

It just takes one caring person to start a movement and, in time and with effort, to save the natural places that we love. I appreciate how the story starts in the forest, which the protagonist and her friends love, and I enjoyed following their journey and decisions on how to proceed to prevent a parking lot from being built in it instead. 

My husband Tom and I started a movement called Protect the Porkies to prevent a sulfide mine from being built right next door to one of the most beloved State Parks, the Porcupine Mountains, in Michigan's Upper Peninsula.

In the beginning, it was only the two of us, but now there are hundreds of thousands of people who are working to spread the word to… show more.