The Light Room

A moving account of art and caretaking in a time of uncertainty and loss

Early reviews called this book a miracle between two covers. In The Light Room , Zambreno writes about the intersections of catastrophes that unfold on a global scale . . . Zambreno writes with a sense of hope that will especially resonate with anyone who's soldiered through pandemic-era parenting

Kate Zambreno has invented a new form. It is a kind of absolute present, real life captured in closeup

The Light Room is both a gift and a beacon

One of our most formally ambitious writers

Kate Zambreno has performed a miracle, capturing real, lived time from within the exhaustion of pandemic-era parenthood. The Light Room reminded me of that fundamental magic of writing-that the details of another person's life, so precisely and honestly rendered, can instantly loosen the edges of your own life and make you feel less alone

One of the great uncategorizable writers of our time

Kate Zambreno is the author of nine books, most recently The Light Room , a meditation on art and care. Tone, a collaborative study with the writer and scholar Sofia Samatar , under The Committee to Investigate Atmosphere , is forthcoming from Columbia University Press. Zambreno's fiction and reports have been published in The New Yorker , The Paris Review , Granta , VQR , Astra , BOMB , and more. Zambreno's books have been translated into seven languages. Kate Zambreno is the Strachan Donnelley Chair in Environmental Writing at Sarah Lawrence College and teaches graduate nonfiction at Columbia University. Zambreno is a 2021 Guggenheim Fellow in Nonfiction.