Summary

In Chapter One, Joan Didion explains why she chose to title this book "Blue Nights." She describes the period of blue nights that occurs in certain parts of the world in the few weeks before and after the summer solstice. These nights when the twilight is blue offer both the promise and possibility of summer, and the reminder that the days will soon begin to shorten. Didion says that blue nights are "the opposite of the dying of the brightness, but they are also its warning" (4).

In Chapter Two, Didion describes her daughter Quintana's wedding day. She focuses on the unique details that Quintana has chosen such as leis instead of bouquets. The flowers that Quintana chooses to wear in her hair remind Joan of the garden in one of the homes they lived in in California when Quintana was a child. She...