A powerful debut from a young Australian novelist that features one of the mostlikeable but contrary figures you are likely to meet in contemporary fictionLou C... » 

A powerful debut from a young Australian novelist that features one of the mostlikeable but contrary figures you are likely to meet in contemporary fictionLou Connor a gifted unhappy sixteenyearold is desperate to escape her lifeof poverty in Sydney. And when she is offered a place as an exchange student ata school in America it seems as if her dreams will be fulfilled. Her hostfamily has a beautiful house in Illinois and couldnt be more welcoming...until she starts having to live in the suffocating and repressed atmosphereof their suburban mansion and things begin to go terribly wrong. How the LightGets In is an acutely observed story of adolescence reminiscent of AmericanBeauty in its dissection of engrained prejudices and middleclass hypocrisy. InLou Connor Hyland has created a largerthanlife protagonist who mesmerisesthe reader with her vivacity and vulnerability from hopeful beginning tounexpected haunting end. «