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When the Lights Go Out
Fantasy novel from Tanith Lee.
377 pages, Paperback
First published April 4, 1994
1 person is currently reading
188 people want to read
About the author
Tanith Lee
614 books1,973 followersTanith Lee was a British writer of science fiction, horror, and fantasy. She was the author of 77 novels, 14 collections, and almost 300 short stories. She also wrote four radio plays broadcast by the BBC and two scripts for the UK, science fiction, cult television series "Blake's 7."
Before becoming a full time writer, Lee worked as a file clerk, an assistant librarian, a shop assistant, and a waitress.
Her first short story, "Eustace," was published in 1968, and her first novel (for children) The Dragon Hoard was published in 1971.
Her career took off in 1975 with the acceptance by Daw Books USA of her adult fantasy epic The Birthgrave for publication as a mass-market paperback, and Lee has since maintained a prolific output in popular genre writing.
Lee twice won the World Fantasy Award: once in 1983 for best short fiction for “The Gorgon” and again in 1984 for best short fiction for “Elle Est Trois (La Mort).” She has been a Guest of Honour at numerous science fiction and fantasy conventions including the Boskone XVIII in Boston, USA in 1981, the 1984 World Fantasy Convention in Ottawa, Canada, and Orbital 2008 the British National Science Fiction convention (Eastercon) held in London, England in March 2008. In 2009 she was awarded the prestigious title of Grand Master of Horror.
Lee was the daughter of two ballroom dancers, Bernard and Hylda Lee. Despite a persistent rumour, she was not the daughter of the actor Bernard Lee who played "M" in the James Bond series of films of the 1960s.
Tanith Lee married author and artist John Kaiine in 1992.
Before becoming a full time writer, Lee worked as a file clerk, an assistant librarian, a shop assistant, and a waitress.
Her first short story, "Eustace," was published in 1968, and her first novel (for children) The Dragon Hoard was published in 1971.
Her career took off in 1975 with the acceptance by Daw Books USA of her adult fantasy epic The Birthgrave for publication as a mass-market paperback, and Lee has since maintained a prolific output in popular genre writing.
Lee twice won the World Fantasy Award: once in 1983 for best short fiction for “The Gorgon” and again in 1984 for best short fiction for “Elle Est Trois (La Mort).” She has been a Guest of Honour at numerous science fiction and fantasy conventions including the Boskone XVIII in Boston, USA in 1981, the 1984 World Fantasy Convention in Ottawa, Canada, and Orbital 2008 the British National Science Fiction convention (Eastercon) held in London, England in March 2008. In 2009 she was awarded the prestigious title of Grand Master of Horror.
Lee was the daughter of two ballroom dancers, Bernard and Hylda Lee. Despite a persistent rumour, she was not the daughter of the actor Bernard Lee who played "M" in the James Bond series of films of the 1960s.
Tanith Lee married author and artist John Kaiine in 1992.
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
October 25, 2023
weird and dreamy Tanith Lee writes her version of a young adult novel; results are weird and dreamy.
synopsis: weird and dreamy Hesta Web (and her "hot red hair") runs away from her despicable mother to a weird and dreamy seaside town, abandoned by tourists during this off-season. strange things occur and Hesta eventually finds her destiny in this cold and timeless place.
the novel is layered and does surprising things, much like the seaside village and its inhabitants, much like Hesta herself. terrible things happen, but with a certain nonchalance: villagers slaughter an arrogant visitor in the pub, and nothing much is made of it; an apparition drops her crying baby out of a window, and it turns out to be a mercy killing. Hesta's mother, mom's equally loathsome lover, and a sad detective they've hired enter the village to find the girl; one shall be sacrificed, another shall meet a more welcoming death, and the third shall revert to childhood. Hesta herself is welcomed by the village, as a priestess come to minister her flock. a secretive agency keeps careful watch on it all, as this is a place where odd powers manifest, where the different come to visit and find themselves staying on.
Hesta is asexual, perhaps the first such heroine I've ever read about. there is a character who is revealed as trans and that reveal made this already intriguing person all the more so. there is an older gay man; Hesta comes to live in his house as his ally and equal. this is a queer kind of book.
When the Lights Go Out is a slippery thing, hard to grasp at times. it was a sometimes frustrating experience - I would have preferred it concentrate more on Hesta. the inclusion of other perspectives, including her pursuers, made the book feel unfocused. but that was clearly the intent: to have a certain lack of focus, a blurry narrative, prose like watercolours, ambiguous characters, things barely spelled out. in the end, Hesta having embraced her fate has come to understand the logic of this weird, dreamy place that she now calls home, in a way that the reader and all other such interlopers never can.
synopsis: weird and dreamy Hesta Web (and her "hot red hair") runs away from her despicable mother to a weird and dreamy seaside town, abandoned by tourists during this off-season. strange things occur and Hesta eventually finds her destiny in this cold and timeless place.
the novel is layered and does surprising things, much like the seaside village and its inhabitants, much like Hesta herself. terrible things happen, but with a certain nonchalance: villagers slaughter an arrogant visitor in the pub, and nothing much is made of it; an apparition drops her crying baby out of a window, and it turns out to be a mercy killing. Hesta's mother, mom's equally loathsome lover, and a sad detective they've hired enter the village to find the girl; one shall be sacrificed, another shall meet a more welcoming death, and the third shall revert to childhood. Hesta herself is welcomed by the village, as a priestess come to minister her flock. a secretive agency keeps careful watch on it all, as this is a place where odd powers manifest, where the different come to visit and find themselves staying on.
Hesta is asexual, perhaps the first such heroine I've ever read about. there is a character who is revealed as trans and that reveal made this already intriguing person all the more so. there is an older gay man; Hesta comes to live in his house as his ally and equal. this is a queer kind of book.
When the Lights Go Out is a slippery thing, hard to grasp at times. it was a sometimes frustrating experience - I would have preferred it concentrate more on Hesta. the inclusion of other perspectives, including her pursuers, made the book feel unfocused. but that was clearly the intent: to have a certain lack of focus, a blurry narrative, prose like watercolours, ambiguous characters, things barely spelled out. in the end, Hesta having embraced her fate has come to understand the logic of this weird, dreamy place that she now calls home, in a way that the reader and all other such interlopers never can.
November 3, 2017
Brilliantly weird urban fantasy. It was like an erotic David Lynch movie being filmed on the set of League of Gentlemen. Dead aunties become elderly mermaids, sentient seagulls dancing in ashtrays full of milk, telekinetic baby removal, Moses is a car driving ghost, old-man escort sex turns middle-aged women into fat children, Susan, Susan, Susan's mother and Susan the turtle. It's weird. It's fantastic. Do yourself a favour and read it.
May 14, 2023
Not my favorite by her, but I love her ideas nonetheless.
June 30, 2012
I adore this book. It's very, very Tanith Lee, which I suppose is a really good thing or a really bad thing depending on your point of view, but to me it's Lee at her best. The plot is peculiar to say the least, not an enormous amount really happens and a lot of what does happen doesn't make a great deal of sense or is never explained at all, but the deeply layered atmosphere of the downright strange keeps me coming back to this one again and again. Love it.
March 9, 2014
The mistress of dark dreams tries her hand at contemporary weird fiction. It's set in a small British beach town, in the off-season. It's home to a strange cult involving sea worship, ritual sacrifices and transformative magic. The plot concerns the rise of a new high priestess for the cult. The novel kind of has the feel of the Wicker Man. The aura of the 90s pervades--references are made to the AIDS crisis and the yuppie class. When The Lights Go Out mixes scenes of supernatural horror with moments of comic tenderness.
October 26, 2017
Wow! Never has so little entertained me so much. Skeletal plot. Scattershot discriptions of an almost hypnagogic state, What a weird ass book. E.g THE CAT RAISED HER HEAD, VOCALISED A PURRING CALL, AND STRETCHED, CATCHING LULU'S EMERALD BEDSPREAD IN WICKED PERMITTED VANDALISTIC CLAWS..... THE CAT WATCHED JUDGEMENTALLY, SMILED WITH HER CHEEKS AND EYES, AND CURLED UP AGAIN TO SLEEP, EMITTING AS SHE DID SO A MINUSCULE FART. Warning ⚠ this is a marmite book Love or Hate I feel may be the most common feelings to this work. Luckily I'm most certainly of the former ☺️
September 23, 2010
I remember really enjoying this one. I loved the strange, sea-side atmosphere.
One of the more enjoyable urban ya fantasies out there.
One of the more enjoyable urban ya fantasies out there.
May 1, 2012
This is one of my favourite books by Lee. When I picked it up to refresh my memories last night, it drew me in all over again. The story is set in modern-day England, and the action takes place in London and in a decaying seaside town in the chilly off-season. Under this drab surface, ancient mythic currents are moving.
Hesta is rather a typical Lee heroine, a cool, wilful and somehow alien teen (comparable to Esther in Days of Grass). She is humanised by her friendship with Janey and with Janey's mother Lulu, who provide a refuge from Hesta's bitter and self-absorbed mother. When mother and her lover push Hesta too far, she takes an offhand revenge and leaves.
The first half of the book is jumpy, with settings and characters changing just as we've gotten interested in them. Hesta first takes shelter with a group of young squatters, whose stories and names echo classic myths. She leaves them behind as she seeks the mystery of her own role in this society, where she seems to be already known, loved, and provided for.
In the last part of the book the characters from the opening come back to importance. Hesta's mother and her lover track her down, and many things are sorted out. Even the ghost convertible has a part to play.
Hesta is rather a typical Lee heroine, a cool, wilful and somehow alien teen (comparable to Esther in Days of Grass). She is humanised by her friendship with Janey and with Janey's mother Lulu, who provide a refuge from Hesta's bitter and self-absorbed mother. When mother and her lover push Hesta too far, she takes an offhand revenge and leaves.
The first half of the book is jumpy, with settings and characters changing just as we've gotten interested in them. Hesta first takes shelter with a group of young squatters, whose stories and names echo classic myths. She leaves them behind as she seeks the mystery of her own role in this society, where she seems to be already known, loved, and provided for.
In the last part of the book the characters from the opening come back to importance. Hesta's mother and her lover track her down, and many things are sorted out. Even the ghost convertible has a part to play.
November 26, 2018
Just reread this one after several years, and am upping the rating from four stars to five. The novel is flat-out weird in so many ways, but Lee writes to beautifully, and with such unpredictability, this story is (to me) way out there in the front of the pack, running miles ahead of the field in the "unease" category!
June 24, 2012
The book that cements the fact that I have a love/hate relationship with Tanith Lee. Mixed metaphors and purple prose really marred the experience for me. But at the same time I applaud her absolute batsh*t insanity! It takes balls to tackle these issues.
February 7, 2018
Weird and enticing, bizarre and slightly twisted.
Made me think a little of Neil Gaiman's American Gods.
Made me think a little of Neil Gaiman's American Gods.
August 4, 2022
Neil Gaiman wishes he wrote this.
July 8, 2020
Tanith Lee reminds me of Michael Moorcock, in that she often had brilliant ideas but wrote too much, too quickly. The result was that her prose frequently has the feel of an Angela Carter first draft (or a Jeanette Winterson fifth or sixth draft) and her construction of longer stories is all over the place. Imagine her as a snooker player - the long pots would be fabulous but you'd never feel she was wholly in control of the cue ball. That's very much the case here, as atmospheric evocations of the English seaside collide with a whole carnival's worth of urban weirdness. One reviewer on here has compared the book to a David Lynch film, and I think that's a good parallel. There are wonderful individual scenes and moments, but there's a lot that doesn't add up and whole chapters which simply don't work. I can't imagine what it would have been like to be Lee's editor...I suspect she was impossible to change. On her day, a brilliantly original and exciting writer, but I don't think this is one of her better works, maybe because I like her shorter fiction and rewritten fairy tales (where she at least has the ghost of a decent plot to work with), or maybe because it's just indecisive and can't determine which of its ideas and themes to develop to best advantage.
November 26, 2012
Incredible, one of Tanith Lee's best.
It's funny, in this story it is the secondary characters that get all the personality. Hesta herself is one of those Tanith Lee protagonists: a stone in a river, with life rushing by all around, while she stands still. The descriptions of the mother make my skin crawl, she seems such an unpleasant woman, and the mother's boyfriend is oily and nasty and comes across wonderfully as a slimeball.
I love the weirdness and symbolism of the entire town, and the role that Hesta accepts for herself, and for the townspeople, in the end. The story is almost based on perceptions and emotions, instead of plot points. So unusual. As is common with Lee's writing, you truly have no idea whatsoever, of what is going to happen next.
Fantastic!
It's funny, in this story it is the secondary characters that get all the personality. Hesta herself is one of those Tanith Lee protagonists: a stone in a river, with life rushing by all around, while she stands still. The descriptions of the mother make my skin crawl, she seems such an unpleasant woman, and the mother's boyfriend is oily and nasty and comes across wonderfully as a slimeball.
I love the weirdness and symbolism of the entire town, and the role that Hesta accepts for herself, and for the townspeople, in the end. The story is almost based on perceptions and emotions, instead of plot points. So unusual. As is common with Lee's writing, you truly have no idea whatsoever, of what is going to happen next.
Fantastic!
June 26, 2015
An adolescent girl with a troubled home life runs away to live in a squat in a seaside town in the off season.
The first sections of the book were much the way the world we live in, "what the ploughman sees", appears in novels, and Tanith is so good at rendering the dreary but also hopeful details I started to wonder if the book was written from her own life. After awhile the book began to be more Tanith-like and less depressing modern novel-like. Then I realized that most of the time, Tanith presents us with her own world, some places she sees and experiences and which she shares with her readers. This is another Tanith world.
The first sections of the book were much the way the world we live in, "what the ploughman sees", appears in novels, and Tanith is so good at rendering the dreary but also hopeful details I started to wonder if the book was written from her own life. After awhile the book began to be more Tanith-like and less depressing modern novel-like. Then I realized that most of the time, Tanith presents us with her own world, some places she sees and experiences and which she shares with her readers. This is another Tanith world.
August 7, 2009
Well this was a strange tale and no mistake. A few people turning out to be rather different than at first described and sex, orientation, even age seemed to be quite a fluid concept.
I liked the way a name was referenced and you had to just check back in the book if that was who you thought it was... took me a few minutes to remember/find the reference right at the end of the book.
I read this one as Tanith Lee was one of the authors in a collection - I like being introduced to new work in this way - hoorah for Goodreads Challenges!
I liked the way a name was referenced and you had to just check back in the book if that was who you thought it was... took me a few minutes to remember/find the reference right at the end of the book.
I read this one as Tanith Lee was one of the authors in a collection - I like being introduced to new work in this way - hoorah for Goodreads Challenges!
July 14, 2010
I read this a long time ago, so I don't really remember much about it now, except that it was really weird.
July 20, 2015
I read this a long time ago. I remember it freaking me out, and I remember enjoying the feeling.
August 29, 2025
Quite amazing.
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews