In the Wild Light

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Buzzfeed Kirkus Reviews Publishers Weekly Chicago Public Library**

Redefines friendship as something that must be protected, sacrificed for, and tended to with wisdom, patience, and love. Ocean Vuong, New York Times bestselling author of On Earth We re Briefly Gorgeous*

• A poignant coming-of-age novel about two best friends whose friendship is tested when they get the opportunity to leave their impoverished small town for an elite prep school. For fans of Looking for Alaska.

  Life in a small Appalachian town is not easy. Cash lost his mother to an opioid addiction and his Papaw is dying slowly from emphysema. Dodging drug dealers and watching out for his best friend, Delaney, is second nature. He's been spending his summer mowing lawns while she works at Dairy Queen. But when Delaney manages to secure both of them full rides to an elite prep school in Connecticut, Cash will have to grapple with his need to protect and love Delaney, and his love for the grandparents who saved him and the town he has to leave behind. Jeff Zentner's new novel is a beautiful examination of grief, found family, and young love.

  New York Times Best Children's Books of 2021
  Publishers Weekly Best Books of 2021
  Kirkus Reviews Best Books of 2021

  "Zentner conjures a moving and rich novel about friendship, loss, kind strangers, the blindness so often present in the pursuit of love, and love itself.  His protagonists have their eyes raised to the sky."—Daniel Woodrell for The New York Times Book Review
  
  “Vitally redefines friendship as something that must be protected, sacrificed for, and tended to with wisdom, patience, and love—and, to our luck, rendered in Zentner’s gem-like sentences.” —Ocean Vuong, New York Times bestselling author of On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous
   
  “In a word: sublime. This gift of a book will leave you with fiery, incandescent hope in your chest.” —Emily Henry, New York Times bestselling author of Beach Read   
   
  “A novel with the soul of a poem. Jeff Zentner proves yet again that he's one of the most luminous voices writing for young people today.” —Randy Ribay, author of National Book Award finalist Patron Saints of Nothing
   
  “An ode to the healing power of nature and art, but also a testament to the beauty of family both blood and created. No one else can write like Jeff Zentner.” —Silas House, New York Times bestselling author of Southernmost and Same Sun Here

  "A brilliant treasure of a book that holds up a mirror to the best parts of our humanity." —Kirkus Reviews, starred review

  "Evocative and moving, highlighting Zentner’s impressive skill with both poetry and prose."—Publishers Weekly, starred review
  
  “A wise, gorgeous exploration of loss and survival that will make readers cry...Lyrical and heartbreaking.”—School Library Journal, starred review
  *
  "Heartfelt and deeply moving...a book that readers will unhesitatingly take to their hearts."—Booklist, starred review*

  "Zentner's signature poetic prose is in full effect as he crafts sentences that read like sweet tea tastes and cotton feels...In the Wild Light is a love letter to possibility."—***Bookpage

  “With profound, evocative prose and lyrical insights into the world surrounding a struggling main character, Zentner's powerful, emotional novel is one you won't soon forget.” —Buzzfeed***

  Autorentext

  JEFF ZENTNER is the author of New York Times Notable Book The Serpent King, Goodbye Days, Rayne & Delilah's Midnite Matinee, and In the Wild Light. He has won the William C. Morris Award, Amelia Elizabeth Walden Award, International Literacy Association Award, Westchester Fiction Award, been longlisted for the Carnegie Medal and UKLA and was a finalist for the Southern Book Prize and Indies Choice Award. He was a Publishers Weekly Flying Start and an Indies Introduce pick. Before becoming a writer, he was a musician who recorded with Iggy Pop, Nick Cave and Debbie Harry. He lives in Nashville with his wife and son. You can visit him online at jeffzentnerbooks.com and on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook.

  Klappentext

  NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times • Buzzfeed • Kirkus Reviews • Publishers Weekly • Chicago Public Library

  “Redefines friendship as something that must be protected, sacrificed for, and tended to with wisdom, patience, and love.” —Ocean Vuong, New York Times bestselling author of On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous*

• A poignant coming-of-age novel about two best friends whose friendship is tested when they get the opportunity to leave their impoverished small town for an elite prep school. For fans of Looking for Alaska.

  Life in a small Appalachian town is not easy. Cash lost his mother to an opioid addiction and his Papaw is dying slowly from emphysema. Dodging drug dealers and watching out for his best friend, Delaney, is second nature. He's been spending his summer mowing lawns while she works at Dairy Queen. But when Delaney manages to secure both of them full rides to an elite prep school in Connecticut, Cash will have to grapple with his need to protect and love Delaney, and his love for the grandparents who saved him and the town he has to leave behind. Jeff Zentner's new novel is a beautiful examination of grief, found family, and young love.

  Leseprobe

Chapter 1

The human eye can discern more shades of green than of any other color. My friend Delaney told me that. She said it’s an adaptation from when ancient humans lived in forests. Our eyes evolved that way as a survival mechanism to spot predators hiding in the vegetation.

There are as many tinges of understanding as there are hues of green in a forest. 

Some things are easy to understand. There’s a natural logic, a clear cause and effect. Like how an engine works. When I was eleven, my papaw pulled the engine out of his Chevy pickup and took it apart, letting me help him rebuild it. He laid the pieces out--reeking of dark oil and scorched steel--on a torn and greasy sheet, like the bones of an unearthed dinosaur. As we worked, he explained the function of each piece and what it contributed to make the engine run. It made sense, how he said it. 

He wasn’t sick then. Later, when he was, I understood that when he used to say Don’t nobody live forever when accepting another piece of his sister Betsy’s chess pie, that wasn’t just a phrase he used. That was when he still had an appetite. 

Now his appetite has moved to his lungs, which are always starved for air. His breathing has the keening note of the wind blowing over something sharp. It’s always there, which means he has something sharp inside him. People can’t live long with sharp things in them. I understand this. 

Some things I understand without understanding them. Like how the Pigeon River moves and pulses like a living creature, never the same twice when I’m on it, which is as often as I can be. Or how sometimes you can stand in a quiet parking lot on a hot afternoon and perfectly envision what it would have looked like there before humankind existed. I do this often. It brings me comfort but I don’t understand why. 

Other things I don’t understand at all. 

How Delaney Doyle’s mind works, for example. Trying to comprehend it is like trying to form a coherent thought in a dream. Every time you th…