Luisa Ochoa-Jones see’s the world in landscapes of color, smelling emotions and tasting sounds. Sometimes she gets lost in the colors and has to ground herself by tapping her foot three times or digging her naked feet into an image of a sandy beach. When the world gets rocked by a virus killing thousands it’s these same sensory visions that could end up saving the world.

The author’s bio states that she’s in film and in fact along with Philip Seymour Hoffman produced the Academy Award winning film Capote. Light Years was written with a very visual theme and the language she uses could easily be transported into a movie. I’ll give you an example:

” The sound of the city dissolves into a hum. I stare up at the gleaming glass tower and a torrent of blue pours down. The building’s edges blur against the cloudless sky–nature and the man-made becoming one. Blue always tastes like chocolate when I’m nervous, and I’m nervous.”

I was fascinated by this use of color and tastes to portray emotions and thought Luisa totally unique. However, I also felt that her inability to feel emotions like we do held the reader back from being able to feel for her as a character. As the story evolved, Luisa’s fate became intertwined with the virus running its course and those bursts of color ended up having little impact on my own emotions making the climax of the novel ho hum. I was disappointed!

The story had such potential. An apocalyptic virus, a love story, and a heroine who journeyed to self discovery while dealing with personal loss. All very emotional themes that just lacked the emotion to give the book impact. ❤️❤️❤️

Click this link to purchase! Light Years Copyright 2018 Deborah Kehoe The Reading Chick All Rights Reserved