THE LOST NIGHT: A MEMOIR
The paperback cover.
On June 22, 1986, Stan Howard was stabbed in his bed, his ten-year-old daughter Rachel asleep in the next room. His murder remains unsolved. In this widely acclaimed memoir, Rachel Howard creates a vivid portrait of Central California in the 1980s–an arid land of strip-malls and fertilizers–and of her flawed but loving father, a Rod Stewart fanatic. Told in unadorned, unsentimental prose, this tale of reconciling with the past provides a richly psychological examination of murder’s aftermath.
Click here to hear Rachel interviewed about her father’s murder by Ira Glass for an episode of “This American Life.”Buy from Amazon.
Read the critical acclaim for The Lost Night.
See a list of Rachel’s readings and appearances.
Get the free book club guide for The Lost Night.
View a gallery of photos related to The Lost Night.
A note from Rachel: If you have lost a relative or friend to violence, I highly recommend getting in touch with Parents of Murdered Children. They have chapters throughout the United States.
Other books about murder from the victim’s perspective that I highly recommend if you are dealing with a loss of your own:
A Rip in Heaven, by Jeanine Cummins
In My Father’s Name, by Mark Arax
And here is the Atlantic Monthly article about murder survivors that completely changed my perspective and my life: A Grief Like No Other, by Eric Schlosser
Present at the murder scene: me, my stepbrother Bobby, my father, and his third wife, Sherrie. This was probably taken a year and a half before his death. The photo appears on the inside title page of the book.
