2 recent reads, both centered on death, as it happens.
The December-January issue of the American Spectator reprints a decades- old essay by Michael Novak about the death of his brother, a Holy Cross priest who was killed in Pakistan in 1964.  It is quite moving on many levels, all of which involve the quest to find hope in the midst of massive, senseless, tragedy.  It looks as if it will be put online later this week. Until then, here is a brief NRO piece Novak wrote on the matter a few years ago.

In the New Yorker, Roger Rosenblatt pens a moving, spare essay called “Making Toast” describing life since the death of his daughter, a woman in her late 30’s who died suddenly, leaving behind three young children and a husband. Rosenblatt and his wife have moved in with the family, and his essay simply describes their lives now. You can only read it online if you are a subscriber, but this issue is still on the newsstand at the bookstore (I read it Friday), I believe, and there’s always your local library.
We may try to convince ourselves it is not, but the truth is, darkness is always around the corner, revealing, in its painful shadows, the needfulness of Light.