57 pages • 1 hour read
Jill SantopoloThe Light We Lost
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2017A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Secrets and Surprises
Darren likes to make grand gestures and to surprise Lucy with gifts. From the beginning, Lucy is annoyed by these moves, calling them “…infantilizing. Or…patronizing” (141) the first time Darren does it. She does not like being cut out of the planning. While Lucy claims that surprising her with a gift like a dog or a house is not something Gabe would do, the reader may disagree. While it was not a surprise gift, Gabe did cut Lucy out of the process of signing on with the Associated Press and moving to Iraq to become a photojournalist. These types of revelations become a theme throughout the novel, as many of the major plot points center on some kind of surprise or secret.
Lucy is a strong, independent career woman who likes to have her voice heard. However, the men she chooses as partners do not always understand this part of her. Gabe showers Lucy with affection and promises never to undermine her dreams. However, he also leaves her alone at a party to speak in an empty room with another woman and hides his decision to move to a war zone. When Lucy meets Darren, he is also kind and considerate, though he does not take her career as seriously as she would like. While Darren never hides a major life decision from Lucy, he has a habit of planning big trips, adopting dogs, and buying houses without her knowledge. Each time Darren does this, Lucy fumes about it, but she does not speak to him about it directly. Her unwillingness to express her unhappiness with Darren over these secrets and surprises leads to her believing he is having an affair when she sees him talking to a woman named Linda on his phone without explanation. Lucy’s belief in this affair allows her to reignite her relationship with Gabe briefly, a decision that could destroy her marriage. However, there is no affair, only a secret purchase Darren thought would delight his wife, not ruin their relationship.
While Lucy claims she dislikes secrets and surprises, she surrounds herself with them. Each time she speaks with Gabe, she tells her husband about the conversation, but her true feelings for Gabe remain hidden from both Darren and Gabe. Lucy is in love with two men, a fact she hides from everyone—even herself at times. While both Darren and Gabe’s secrets have consequences, Lucy’s secret affair results in the most damage. It causes both Darren and Gabe pain and leads to the conception of a child who is caught in the middle of a situation he did not ask for. In the end, Lucy has the biggest secret.
Freewill or Fate
From the beginning of the novel, conveyed through a quote from Julius Caesar, freewill versus fate is a theme of the novel. Lucy wonders from time to time what brought Gabe into her life on the many occasions they find each other. The first time they meet is in a Shakespeare seminar, and the only open seat happens to be next to Lucy. That fateful day also happens to be September 11, 2001, a day that no one could soon forget. The tragedy underscores the intensity of Gabe and Lucy’s first few interactions and their first kiss. When they meet again just over a year after graduation, Lucy again wonders about the possibility of running into a long-lost friend on the street in a large city where one might not know their neighbor: “Fate versus free will. Maybe it’s both” (27).
There are many moments in the novel when Lucy and Gabe cross paths before and after their romantic relationship. These moments can feel like fate, as though the universe is pulling them together for a reason. However, the same could be said about Lucy’s relationship with Darren. Meeting him at her share in the Hamptons seems fated. Kind and gentle, Darren is the only man to make her laugh in the dark days after Gabe’s departure. It also seems fated that she fits his list of the most desirable woman’s traits. If they had met any other time, their relationship might not have happened. Maybe the universe pulled them together, too.
Lucy debates these ideas throughout the novel, questioning why Gabe happens to cross her mind at important moments. It could be fate that he calls on the morning of her wedding to make her question her commitment to Darren. It could also be fate that he is on a late-night talk show talking about his book while she suffers insomnia during her second pregnancy. And it could be fate that the washing machine starts leaking on the one and only time Gabe ever visits Lucy’s home with Darren.
Lucy spends a lot of time imagining her connection to Gabe is fated, but at the end of the book, she finally concludes that it is the result of freewill. She tells her child in a letter, “It was my choice. It’s been my choice all along” (293). While their meetings on September 11, 2001 and on her birthday a year after graduation might feel fated, the way they continue to reach out to each other and remain intertwined in each other’s lives is a choice.
Finding Light in Darkness
September 11, 2001 was one of the darkest days in American history. At the same time, there was light in the way people responded, coming out to volunteer and support one another. By setting this day as the background of the novel, Santopolo illustrates the theme of finding light in the darkness.
Gabe lived with an unpredictable and violent father as a child. As a result, he had to grow up faster than most children and care for his mother when their roles should have been reversed. In adulthood, Gabe lives with a fear of becoming like his father —someone incapable of fulfilling his dreams, experiencing true happiness, and offering someone a loving and secure relationship. This is the darkness that lives inside Gabe. At the same time, Gabe has an amazing gift in which he finds light in the darkest of places and photographs it, documenting history with grace and respect. However, that gift does not allow him to look inward and find the same light in himself.
As Gabe places himself in the middle of darkness, living and working in the hotbed of post-9/11 military conflicts, Lucy lives an almost mundane life. While Gabe might see Lucy as his light and his muse, she experiences life through disappointments and frustrations. She grieves when Gabe leaves her before falling into the arms of a man who loves her intensely. However, rather than bask in the light coming from the love of this man, she doubts him and finds fault in him. Lucy is uncomfortable living in the light without Gabe. Only when Gabe dies does she recognize that her light came from Gabe. While Gabe felt he was filled with darkness because of his father, Lucy believes she lived in darkness because she lost Gabe. They both found light in each other, a level of happiness that was unsustainable, and were left feeling the ache of the darkness without each other. Meanwhile, the setting parallels this by showing the world before 9/11 and the world after.
