Blood Moon

In Blood Moon, the lingering effects of trauma and the search for healing are central to both Beth’s and John’s character arcs and drive their actions. The narrative explores the long-term impacts of trauma, demonstrating how unresolved grief can profoundly impact characters personally and also the people around them.

Beth embodies the lingering effects of trauma and the search for healing. When her sister died at 16, her father killed her mother and then himself. Beth knows that they did it because they felt like they had nothing to live for, and she is dismissive when John tells her that they still had a living daughter. Beth responds to this grief in two ways: She isolates herself from others and doesn’t seek a serious romantic relationship, and she becomes determined to seek out the truth. When she realizes that Crisis Point missed a crucial piece of evidence on the Crissy Mellin case, she flies to Louisiana in search of the truth.

In contrast, John is determined to avoid searching for the truth because Crissy’s case destroyed his life. He tried to point out that Billy Oliver was not Crissy’s killer, but Tom Barker black-listed him and ruined his career.