Why I Write About Darkness (And What I Hope Readers Find There)

Sometimes, people will ask me: why do you write about such difficult things? Loss, death, crime, evil, grief--these aren't easy topics. Why not write something lighter, something easier to carry?

It’s a fair question.

The answer is simple: Because darkness is real, and pretending it isn’t doesn’t make it go away.

Stories have always been one of the ways we make sense of the world around us. Not just the parts that are comfortable or easy to explain, but the parts that unsettle us. The parts we’d rather not look at directly. Ignoring those things doesn’t protect us from them. If anything, it leaves us less prepared.

I don’t write about darkness for its own sake. I write about it because of what happens inside it. The only way we will ever have clarity, courage and choice is to face what we fear the most.

When everything is going well, it’s easy to assume we know who we are. It’s easy to believe we would do the right thing, make the right call, stand firm when it matters. But it’s in the harder moments—when the outcome is uncertain, when the cost is real—that those assumptions are tested.

Not when everything is easy, but when it isn’t. That’s where truth shows up. That’s where character is revealed, not imagined. That’s where people discover what they’re willing to face.

Sometimes, that discovery isn’t comfortable. It can be messy, complicated, even unsettling. But it’s also where something meaningful can emerge. We might make a decision that matters. We might take a step forward that wasn’t guaranteed. We might even show a refusal to look away from things we'd rather not see.

One example of this is the problem--very real, very relevant--of human trafficking. I chose, during In the Realm of Angels, to highlight this issue. I did not do it gratuitously--I hope. But I also hope that I showed enough of the edge of that problem for you to walk away with a clear understanding: human beings, thousands of them, are being forced into lives that have little to no resemblance to our daily living--all for the pleasure of a few and the profit of even fewer. That is a reality outside the pages of my book from which we should not avert our eyes.

What I hope readers find in these stories isn’t despair. It’s recognition of the fact that difficult moments don’t erase our ability to act—they define it. Even in situations that feel overwhelming, there is still agency. We always have the possibility of choosing something different and better.

That doesn’t mean everything is always resolved neatly. Real life rarely works that way, and neither do the stories I write. But it does mean that darkness isn’t the end of the story; it’s the place where the story becomes clear.

Because the purpose of stepping into the dark isn’t to stay there—it’s to see more clearly.

📚 Angels Trilogy🌿 Coming soon: The Savannah Mysteries