Luminous on the Threshold

About the Book

Grief is an isolating experience. Lost – not only the loved one, but also life as it previously had been lived. Lost – the closeness of many from whom support is most needed. People simply do not know how to interact with the bereaved, and the grief- stricken, numb and exhausted, are incapable of helping them to understand. It is often years after the event before the bereaved are able to speak of their experience. And sometimes it is years after the event before those who have been close to the situation can listen.

Written by the grandmother and the six year old brother of Emma, a baby girl who died at the age of four and a half months following open-heart surgery, Luminous on the Threshold is a high-impact collection of meditative photographs, brief accounts of grief as experienced by a family, and incisive suggestions. Describing the raw passage of loss, the needs of a bereaved person – in this case a parent, and the emergence of that changed person into a new life, this book is a rendering of the tenaciousness of a spirit of hope that rises in the human heart in the face of shattering despair, and even in the thoughts and words of a young child.

In a simple and straightforward manner, Luminous on the Threshold provides validation for those who desperately seek reassurance that somehow they will go on – and helpful information for those who would help them to do so.

At some point in time everyone will need this book. Purchase it today for someone who has lost a loved one. Buy it to better understand how to help that person. Acquire it to process a loss that you have experienced. Buy it and talk about it with others. Buy it to help break through the collective societal silence about death.

About the Author

A Volunteer Naturalist for the Wellfleet Bay Audubon Wildlife Sanctuary and a semi-retired Psychologist, Dr. Denessen lives on Cape Cod. She has traveled extensively by automobile throughout the United States and Maritime Canada with her young adult grandchildren, lodging in a tent and cooking on a camp stove. She particularly enjoys spending time with her family, reading, hiking and playing her Native American flute. Dr. Denessen is the author of Little Dipper: Roots of Healing, Tides of Change (Dreamcatcher Publishing, 2007; Xlibris, 2010), a memoir of her experience in her cabin in the woods of coastal Canada. She is co-author, with her grandson Derrick Soares, of Luminous on the Threshold: Hope for the Bereaved and Help for Those Who Would Stand by Them (Xlibris, 2007), written subsequent to the death of her granddaughter, Derrick’s sister.