Home Feed
Home
Search
Search
Add Review, Blurb, Quote
Add
Activity
Activity
Profile
Profile
A Town with Half the Lights On
A Town with Half the Lights On: A Novel | Page Getz
1 post | 1 read
For readers of J. Ryan Stradal and The Music of Bees (with a dash of FX's The Bear) comes a quirky and refreshing epistolary novel about a family of culture-shocked Brooklynites transplanted to Goodnight, Kansas and their fight for their unexpected lifeline: the legendary May Day Diner. Welcome to Goodnight, Kansas. Population: Many Kansans, three New Yorkers, and one chance to save the place they love most With more wind chimes than residents, folks don't move to Goodnight when their lives are going well. That's why all eyes are on chef Sid Solvang and his family from the moment they turn down Emporia Road to the dilapidated Victorian they inherited. While Sid searches for work and a way back to Brooklyn, his daughter searches for answers to the cryptic messages her grandfather left behind to save both her family and the town. But then Sid makes an impulsive purchase: the fledgling May Day Diner, an iconic eatery under the threat of the wrecking ball. As the Solvangs search for their ticket out, they discover the truth of Goodnight: one of heart and tradition, of exploitation and greed, and neighbors you would do anything to save. And the Solvangs must navigate all of itplus a wayward girl named Disco, a host of rambunctious alpacas, and the corrupt factory sustaining the townin order to find their way back home...wherever that may be. Told through diary entries, emails, school notes, and an anonymous town paper of the Lady Whistledown variety, A Town with Half the Lights On is a tender testament to the notions that home isn't just the place you live, family isn't just your relatives, and it's almost never easy to find the courage to do what's right.
Amazon Indiebound Barnes and Noble WorldCat Goodreads LibraryThing
review
Mattsbookaday
post image
Mehso-so

A Town with Half the Lights On, by Page Getz (2025)

Premise: A struggling Kansas town gets a new lease on life when a big-city family moves in.

Review: This is a book with wonderful values and a giant heart that is absolutely in the right place. Unfortunately, while I‘m sure this is the last thing the author would have wanted (she is from Kansas), it came across as a bit of a ‘coastal big city‘ version of the ‘white saviour‘ phenomenon. Cont.

Mattsbookaday I think there was a way of telling this story that would have highlighted the long history of cooperative movements among farmers and workers in the heartland instead of having the out-of-towners have all the answers. Also, as much as I love epistolary novels, I don‘t think it worked well for this story. So, in all, I‘d say this took a big swing but was more of a bloop single into left field instead of a home run.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫
1w
7 likes1 comment