Out of Darkness

In the Prologue of Out of Darkness, Ashley Hope Pérez presents the night of the New London school disaster of 1937—the aftermath of a gas explosion which leveled the newly built school and killed approximately 300 students and teachers. She presents the visceral reality of the scene, in which victims are recovered in pieces and their bodies stacked atop each other in makeshift morgues. Volunteers and professional rescue teams search through the devastation, rarely finding survivors. The nearby hospitals are overwhelmed with the influx of patients, and many children survive the initial blast only to die before they can be transported for treatment. Parents search for their children, hoping that they can identify them among the parts salvaged from the site. The community is leveled by their collective shock and grief.

Among the volunteer helpers is Wash Fuller, who was tending the garden of the school’s superintendent when the blast occurred. Arriving minutes after the explosion to search for his beloved girlfriend Naomi and her twin half-siblings, Wash enters the building and sees a shoe he recognizes.

On their first day of school in New London, Texas, 17-year-old Naomi Vargas walks her twin half-siblings, seven-year-old Beto and Cari, to school.