Dodging linearity, subverting convention, eluding particularity, it awes. With these micro-histories of six lighthouses—silent pillars of the coast—Barrera conjures a melancholic ode to the unreachable, quintessential beauty of solitude. You can’t look away. On Lighthouses hypnotizes in all the ways a book ought to, calling to mind the very nature of books.

Barrera's obsession is contagious. Her graceful sentences ensnare tidbits of history and tantalizing glimpses of her own life, accompanied by delicate sketches of lighthouses she's visited, making this book a refuge from everyday life, a place of enchantment and safety..

A slim, idiosyncratic history of these structures and their appearances in literature—from Robert Louis Stevenson, whose father and grandfather engineered them, to Virginia Woolf, to Ray Bradbury—the book allows the reader flashes of Barrera’s emotional life amid the accumulated detail.

... six poignant personal essays.

This free-associative style makes for pleasant reading, but doesn’t often lead the essays to satisfying conclusions. Barrera writes that 'there are collections that will always be incomplete,' an observation that seems all too apt for this intriguing but aimless work..

Each story includes a wide array of topics in lighthouse culture, including literature, history, science, art, music, and the daily, brutal lives of the isolated keepers and their families.