Summary

Hunting by Stars opens with a few sentences by an unnamed narrator who briefly explains being captured. Looking back, he realizes he should have known that the call of the crows was a warning.

Chapter 1, titled “Proof of Life,” opens from French's perspective. He is dreaming about his brother Mitch. They are in a tree house, just as they were shortly before Mitch was captured. In the dream, he sees empty speech bubbles and cannot hear what they are saying. Mitch's statement appears in a speech bubble and knocks over a toy soldier. Meanwhile, things outside speed up, including the enormous amount of trash in the ocean. They are suddenly in a subdivision where people are clearly sick. These victims of the plague, identified as “the dreamless,” are easy to identify as they stumble around. They see Mitch and French as “dreamers, providers...