From the very beginning, the prologue in which Irene contemplates death by suicide, the novel explores the devasting grief that follows the loss of a loved one. The power of both love and grief to persist is a testimony to the power of human attachment, which is as significant a force in the novel as any of the natural elements that influence the lives of those who live in La Esperanza.

The narrator experiences the enduring power of grief through two significant losses. The first is the loss of her mother when she is not yet seven, a loss that literally changes the narrator’s identity. This change in her name from Joan, the name her mother gave her, to Irene, the identity of a stranger, also serves as a metaphor for how a bereaved person can feel reshaped by loss. Irene cannot even identify herself as her mother’s daughter because of fears that she and her grandmother will be harmed by the association. As a child, Joan deals with this separation by pretending that her mother is alive and leading a celebrated life elsewhere. As an adult, she feels the enduring effects of this bereavement in her reluctance to share the truth of her past, even with

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