"Duffy’s honesty and vulnerability resonate with emotional intensity" —Kirkus Reviews
"A must-read for any woman facing the path of begin again" —Marnie Woodrow, author of Heyday
Build the mantra you need right now.
When the author’s marriage breaks down after 16 years, she embarks on a journey of transformative learning. Sometimes heart-wrenching, sometimes celebratory but always ethereal, Mo’s testimony bears an examination of the emotional plane that everyone in a marriage should explore.
From the shock of discovery of deconstruction through to the easement of rehoming, Radiant White Light brings us through a divorce to the tenderness of vulnerability and displacement, under the waters of forgiveness and finally to a place where life will never be the same.
For those walking through the unknown of separation, this memoir offers clarity, courage, and the comfort of shared experience.
From the book:
i breathed deeply and threw the contents of my suitcase
on the floor in a grand gesture. suddenly there it was—
the journal i thought was lost.
my examination of divorce culture: the poetry,
the bright lights, the takeaways, the guideposts.
radiant.
white.
light.
the book’s pink cover glittered with golden stars.
daydreams. my words, the story, my testimony.
it had been with me all along.
"Duffy’s honesty and vulnerability resonate with emotional intensity"
"Radiant White Light is a brave grief ballad about the unique pain that is a divorce. In this case, a split navigated with compassion and raw honesty. Mo Duffy's poetic memoir has the power of Patti Smith, lit up by her own tender quest to understand who she’ll be after marriage. A must-read for any woman facing the path of begin again."
"Radiant. White. Light.: A Divorce Memoir is a poetic, post-separation and divorce memoir by Mo Duffy. The speaker invokes the ‘radiant white light’ of the book’s title to riff on the words’ many varied meanings — those that correspond to a painful separation from a spouse, and those that connote the dissolving of identity after 16 years of an otherwise happy, productive partnership… Divorce can have an upside in the long run; it offers the possibility of rebirth, self-reinvention. However, the early part of divorce is invariably disorienting and distressing. I believe that Duffy’s descriptions of the sudden strangeness of ordinary tasks, those that pertain to children’s activities, and any others one has grown accustomed to doing with a partner, will speak to readers who are going through a separation or divorce."