Out of Darkness

by Ashley Hope Pérez · 2015

Set in the oil‑rich town of New London, Texas, in 1937, *Out of Darkness* follows Naomi Vargas, a Mexican‑American teen, and Wash Fuller, a Black teenager, as they navigate a world divided by rigid color lines. Their forbidden attraction ignites amid a community where segregation is enforced with violence, and the looming threat of the historic New London school explosion—a disaster that would become the deadliest school tragedy in U.S. history—casts a ticking clock over their lives. Pérez weaves a powerful, layered narrative that blends the intensity of a Romeo‑and‑Juliet romance with the stark realities of racism, family loyalty, and the sudden, catastrophic loss that reshapes the town. The novel offers a vivid, heartbreaking portrait of love and resistance in a time when crossing a line could mean disaster.