When the Stars Go Dark

“I wouldn’t let go of my child’s body. ‘Detective Hart,’ he said over and over as my mind gasped, plummeting. As if that person could still possibly exist.”

The Prologue humanizes the tragedy of Anna Hart. Her reaction to the death of her daughter is reflected in other descriptions of other mothers and how they handled the traumatic moment of grief when they lost a child and suggests how these mothers will never be the same.

“That works for people too. Anyone under your nose just disappears. That’s the danger zone, right next to you. Whoever it is you trust the most.”

Hap, in many ways Anna’s trusted mentor, cautions her about what he calls the “blind spot,” how someone a person most trusts, someone a person allows to be closest, can still at any moment simply and absolutely disappear.

“‘How do we bear them?’ I finally asked. ‘Those impossible things.’ His hand was still and warm on mine, warm and steady and alive. He hadn’t moved an inch from my side. ‘Like this, sweetheart.’”

Loss is woven into the fabric of living, so learning to navigate loss becomes a significant part of our journey. Here, Hap offers reassuring optimism: In the end, after enduring impossible things such loss or betrayal or violence, a person finds someone’s hand to hold onto.