This literary memoir spans a lifetime, taking the reader from the emotional coming of age of a girl in the aftermath of her mother’s mysterious death through the life of a woman who navigates later middle age with her mother’s lessons. It explores how attitudes toward suicide have changed from secrecy and shame to compassion since the middle of the twentieth century because of advances in medicine; how a suicide, especially one kept secret, can affect a family; how memories of a person can form a legacy for survivors.