A Broken Heart Still Beats

A remarkable collection of poetry, fiction, and essays compiled by a journalist and a social worker, both of whom have lost a child, A Broken Heart Still Beats, by Anne McCracken and Mary Semel, gets to the heart of this hardest of trials. Raymond Carver, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Williams Shakespeare, Jill Kerr Conway, Judith Guest, Dominick Dunne, Anne Morrow Lindberg, and Albert Camus are among the writers whose works explore the shock, the grief, and the search for meaning that come with the death of a child. Seasoned with wisdom and experience, their words offer rare comfort and insight to those who need it most.

“As one who has experienced the tragic, untimely death of a child, I have found this anthology of similar experiences an excellent source of comfort and healing.”
—Former Senator George McGovern, author of Terry, My Daughter’s Life-and-Death struggle with Alcoholism

“By putting words to what is surely the most unspeakable of life’s losses, this eloquent and painfully honest book may help make the darkness a little less dark, the loneliness a little less lonely.”
—Judith Viorst, author of Necessary Losses

“Throughout the ages, it has been among literature’s primary tasks to give voice to grief, to come to terms with loss, and to transform suffering into strength. Anne McCracken and Mary Semel have gone to that deep well for us and brought us its healing waters.”
—Richard Hoffman, author of Half the House: A Memoir

“This gentle, generous, and honest book reminds me why I prefer the company of the brokenhearted. Their hearts are larger.”
—Phyllis Theroux, author of The Book of Eulogies