A story for mothers and daughters. A story for international students, who will never share a home with their parents again. Oh how this makes me want to hug my mom endlessly.

Thanks to Netgalley for the Arc.

I happened to join the reading party really late. Should have read it right after I got my hands on it. Anyways, I am glad I picked it regardless.

This book is a tight hug for those who miss your moms. As we grow old, we tend to distance ourselves from our parents just because our likes and dislikes aren't the same anymore. We have different lives to lead and we don't often see our parents as friends or someone who would understand your life choices. This book is a gentle reminder to give your relationship a chance. Talk to them, listen to them. They might just turn out to be the best friend you never knew you needed.

#BlueLightHours #NetGalley

Unfortunately really struggled to get into this one after thinking it was so promising! I think the writer is very talented the story just fell flat for me personally.

So moving and beautifully written. It was a slow read at first but I am so glad I stuck with it. The gorgeous title made me want to pick it up. The narrative switch was interesting and well-executed.

Blue Light Hours is a beautifully written and emotionally rich novel that explores themes of grief, identity, and the immigrant experience. The prose is poetic, with vivid imagery that paints the protagonist's inner turmoil and the complexities of her relationships. The exploration of emotional vulnerability is powerful, and the book offers insightful reflections on memory and belonging.

“There was something disturbing in my comfort, in how much I felt that I’d always belonged here, despite the foreignness my classmates and professors claimed to see. You’re so eloquent, so smart, such a great writer, they said, for a nonnative speaker of English, as though I’d congratulate them on their perceptiveness in catching the imposter in their midst.”⁣
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From: 𝘉𝘭𝘶𝘦 𝘓𝘪𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘏𝘰𝘶𝘳𝘴 by Bruna Dantas Lobato⁣
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This was a beautiful little surprise. It was the last book of 2024 for me and I was so happy with the timing of my choice. It had exactly the atmosphere I was looking for at the time. The premise might not seem too compelling, but the way BDL tells this story is so very original. It’s about a Brazilian student, a young woman, spending time abroad in the US for the first time, and about her relationship with her mother back in Brazil and how that relationship changes and forms through their, at least at first, daily Skype calls. Reading this reminded me of the first few weeks I spent in Boston when I moved there when I was 24 and it felt quite lonely, but also so free in all its possibilities. ⁣
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I loved the picture BDL painted here; the strong use of imagery and scenery of her lonely dorm room in snowy Vermont versus the light blue skies back in Brazil, the colors that paint her views and the skype calls with her mother, especially the way she uses the blue light in so many ways, without making it too obvious. We get to see how the protagonist observes this new world around her and it is both sensitive and intelligent. BDL’s writing is plain without losing style and subtle without losing meaning. If that makes sense. And then to think that English is her second language! So impressive. It also made me excited to read all the works she has translated, one of which won the National Book Award last year (𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘞𝘰𝘳𝘥𝘴 𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘙𝘦𝘮𝘢𝘪𝘯 by Stênio Gardel)! ⁣
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I highly recommend this short novel and hope it gets read more widely!⁣
📚 📖💙

Blue Light Hours refer to the hours a mother/daughter spend together four thousand miles apart yet together through a Skype window. They get this small window into one another’s worlds as they spend countless hours reimagining their relationship and recounting their days now that they don’t live them side by side. The daughter has moved to America from Brazil for college and is navigating all the layers of that while her mother remains home in Brazil. Home doesn’t feel right for either of them, but neither the mom nor the daughter wants the other to worry. Instead, they yearn.

There is so much quietly yet beautifully done in these pages. Nothing happens, except the morphing of one of the most important relationships in their lives. I soaked in every sentence and absolutely loved it and am in awe of it. Thank you so much @fictionmatters and @groveatlantic for making sure this book got into my hands.

Blue Light Hours is a heartwarming and insightful read about the communication between a mother and daughter through Skype. The daughter lives in the USA attending university at Vermont while the mother stays back in Natal, Brazil. The Skype calls consist of life updates and comforting each other though loneliness. The story takes place over several years as she completes her studies and lands a job.

Lobato captures the first thrill of independence felt by the daughter as she begins life in a new country along with the anxiety of fitting in and the homesickness usually accompanying students who travel to a different city or country. The feeling of wanting to experience two different things at once is portrayed beautifully in this book. The writing is poetic and lovely which mirrors the mood very well.

I could relate to the daughter having moved away from home to attend university in a different city. I didn't do Skype calls but phone calls were a regular part of life. I cherished my independence but also missed many things I had taken for granted before.

A delightful and poignant read which will remain with you for a long time

Bittersweet, fairly cozy. Akin to Sally Rooney's work in the straightforward, but descriptive prose. I enjoyed it but I'm not sure if it should have been expanded to a larger piece. I've never read the original short story this was based, but I imagine that it made more sense as a shorter work, considering that it ebbs and flows. It's a slow, easy read that ends up as a comfort read, but it is very slow-paced. If you're not into curling up with a book, and want a page-turner, this isn't it. It's the passage of time, the mundane daily life, the contrasts and slowly widening gap between the mother and daughter. And that's what's beautiful about it.

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC.

I found this a slow, gentle and beguiling read, although perhaps not one of any great consequence. It’s the story of a young girl who travels to the US leaving behind her much loved mother in her native Brazil. Nothing much happens. There’s no great drama. She settles in, makes friends, her studies go well. She misses her mother but has long conversations with her on Skype and remains close to her. Although the mother/daughter relationship is at the heart of the novel, there are no new insights or revelations, and the pared down prose leads to a pared down narrative that remains curiously unemotional in spite of emotion being at the heart of the book. Enjoyable to read, poignant at times, but I felt at a distance throughout and didn’t become truly invested in the two main characters.

Thanks to the Author, Net Galley & the publisher for a copy of this book in exchange for a fair & honest review. This book really speaks to the contradictions of survival in the 21st century. How we are so connected & yet siloed in the loneliness of our individual experiences.

The story follows a young Brazilian woman going to school in America. While her mother stays behind in Brazil & is left facing poor physical & mental health in wake of her daughter’s absence. Mother & daughter stay connected using technology but this novel will have you asking what does “connected” even mean. The writing is lyrical and beautifully crafted.


Ideal Reader:
Readers who like reflective stories about mothers & daughters. Readers who enjoyed Tom Lake by Ann Patchett. Readers who want to ugly cry.

Keywords: Literary, Mothers & Daughters, Brazilian Fiction, Slice-of-life,
International Students in America

I did not finish this book as it was not something I wanted to finish, primarily due to its robotic dejected nature, and the lackluster content.

This was lovely. A slow, tender, heartfelt story about a mother and daughter relationship after the daughter moves to the US to study. I took my time with this one, but always looked forward to reading it. Highly recommend. Thank you so much to NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for the ARC.

A story about a daughter and a mother trying to navigate loneliness after the daughters moving abroad. The author presented such a vivid and close picture of all the feelings and mishaps that arise with starting out at life as a newly independent and adult person, free from your family and alone in the world.

An Indie Next Pick for November, this novel focuses on the video conversations between a mother living in Brazil and her college-aged daughter living in Vermont. Each page is filled with quiet, tender, and aching moments.

I enjoyed this book but didn’t love it. It reminded me of moving away to uni and video calling my mum everyday whilst feeling more and more detached from her world.

I struggled with the characters being referred to as “the mother” and “the daughter”. It made the story feel stale.

A tight, compact barely-more-than-novella based on the author's fiction debut story. She's translated work from Brazilian that I've loved (<i>The Words That Remain</i>) and liked a lot (<i>Moldy Strawberries</i>), so I was primed for a good experience. I got that indeed.

Loneliness and that indescribable parent-feeling compounded of intense longing for the child you've had every day of their life as your primary focus mixed with huge dollops of pride in their accomplishment that's led them away from you, and the freezing fear of what you know can and will happen to hurt them where you just can't be. And, of course, resentment that this stellar being needs to be so far away to feel grown up. I was pleased that the author's stand-in was so dutiful and so genuinely, if sometimes impatiently, loving toward her mother in their long-distance relationship.

If you have, or were, a child, it's going to speak to you. It's told mostly from the author-placeholder's PoV, but we do hear directly from her mother at the end. It will sound, and feel, familiar to older folks. It will offer some insights to younger ones. It will do all this without leaving you feeling Taught. I am morally certain Author Lobato has been in this exact skin, it fits the reader so well.

Why I recommend it to you now is the fall has fallen, there's chill in our Northern Hemisphere air, trees are coloring up, and that's the time for a hot steaming mug for sipping and a long sleeve for sniffling into. You'll do a lot of both of 'em.

I'd offer a fifth star had the ending not felt like it was given a mildly short shrift. It's not bad, it's organic to the story, it's just not quite enough for a full, complete experience of her mother's part of their life.

A first novel made from Life, and grown from a short story could not hope for a better apotheosis. This will not, I hope, be the last work of her own long fiction Author Lobato publishes. Those will feel even more accomplished.

A daughter and a mother use their frequent live chats on Skype to maintain their relationship and to navigate the lonely waters they both find themselves in after the daughter leaves home (Brazil) to go and study in the US (Vermont).

Although the daughter is lonely and has to find her feet in this new world we see no sign of her going back home, not even for a visit. Money is a problem yes but I felt that there was more underneath, it felt like she did not want to go back, why? Pity it wasn't examined, I would have liked that.

An ARC gently provided by author/publisher via Netgalley.

This novel! This novel got me right in the feels. I have such a vivid, visceral memory of my first semester of college, living away from home for the first time, and the surprising need to connect with those back home. The narrator of this little gem is a young woman from Brazil who has journeyed to Vermont to attend university. Nearly every night, she speaks to her beloved mother via Skype. It's so endearing, so beautiful. They talk about ordinary, quotidian events, yet it's the most realistic dialogue I've read in ages. I loved this story. It made me miss my mom, Everyone, call your mom while you still can.

This beautifully-written novel by Bruna Dantas Lobato is an innovative tale about a family's love and longing revealed during lengthy exchanges back and forth on it's computers. A mother and daughter seek connection through Skype. Attending a liberal arts college in Vermont, fashioned after Bennington, the daughter is 4,000 miles away from her Brazilian mother.

They talk on Skype with the blue light glowing from their computers, trying to keep their relationship current and upbeat. The mother talks about her television soap operas, the daughter talks about the weather (it often snows in the winter in Vermont) and about her friends.

My favorite part of this book was the mother going out on a date with a co-worker who asked her if she wouldn’t prefer a daughter who was “a little stupid” that kept house.

Her date’s questions act as a catalyst spurring the mother to action, leading to a satisfying ending and one of hope.