Here in the Dark Summary, Characters and Themes

Here in the Dark by Alexis Soloski is a psychological literary thriller set in the atmospheric world of New York theater. 

It follows Vivian Parry, a sharp, emotionally guarded theater critic whose solitary life is upended by a chilling mystery that draws her into the shadows of her own past. Through a blend of suspense, literary introspection, and complex family secrets, Soloski explores the blurred boundaries between performance and reality.

Summary

Vivian Parry, once known as Beatrice, has carved out a niche as a respected, if somewhat reclusive, theater critic in New York. Her earliest memories are intertwined with performance.

The novel opens with her childhood self fainting during a school play, unsettled by the vividness of staged violence. Her mother comforts her, drawing a line between reality and performance.

This formative moment foreshadows Vivian’s adult persona. She is someone who views the world at a critical distance, always aware of the role-playing inherent in daily life.

Vivian’s orderly, solitary existence is interrupted by a strange phone call from David Adler. He claims to be a graduate student researching theater critics.

Their ensuing meeting quickly unsettles her. David seems to know details about her that are not public knowledge, including her previous identity as Beatrice.

His questions veer into the personal. Vivian leaves the encounter deeply rattled.

A few weeks later, Vivian is contacted by Irina, a distressed woman claiming to be David’s fiancée. David has gone missing, and Irina insists that Vivian was the last person to see him.

Vivian is drawn into the mystery, both out of guilt and out of a compulsion to understand David’s disturbing familiarity with her past. She’s soon approached by Jake Levitz, a private investigator, who encourages her to revisit every interaction with David and look for clues.

As she investigates, Vivian is forced to confront her own carefully locked-away memories. She revisits the location of her meeting with David and digs into his supposed background, only to discover that much of it is fabricated.

His professors and classmates don’t know him. The lines between Vivian’s professional detachment and personal vulnerability begin to blur.

Vivian receives a cryptic email containing an old image from her college acting days, clearly meant as a taunt or warning. Her anxiety escalates after a break-in at her apartment.

Nothing is stolen, but small, unsettling changes indicate that someone has invaded her space and knows intimate details about her life. Levitz suggests she step back, but Vivian presses on, determined to unravel David’s true motivations.

Her search leads her deeper into her own family history. She begins to uncover secrets about her mother’s involvement with a theater company in the 1980s—a company marked by tragedy and rumors of a cover-up.

Through conversations with former actors and the discovery of an old notebook, Vivian learns that her mother may have been involved in a production that ended in violence. The incident left long-lasting repercussions for everyone involved.

A new theory emerges. David’s obsession might not be with Vivian herself, but with her mother, or even with an incident that happened decades ago.

The possibility that David is a relative—perhaps even a half-brother—begins to haunt her. This suspicion is stoked by another message: a video of her mother in an old play, watched intently by a young man who resembles David.

Determined to confront both her past and the present danger, Vivian agrees to a tense meeting at a derelict theater. The encounter with David is emotionally fraught, brimming with accusations, confessions, and the threat of violence.

Both are seeking answers and validation, but neither finds easy resolution. As authorities get involved and David’s true identity comes to light, the boundaries between victim and perpetrator, reality and performance, remain blurred.

Vivian is left to grapple with her own identity, her mother’s legacy, and the role that secrets play in shaping lives. In the aftermath, she finally turns inward, reconciling with her history and channeling her experience into her writing—forever changed, but no longer in the dark.

Characters

Vivian Parry

Vivian Parry stands at the heart of Here in the Dark as both protagonist and lens through which the reader experiences the story’s unsettling mysteries. She is a theater critic whose life is marked by emotional restraint, a need for control, and a distinct detachment that traces back to a formative childhood experience during a play.

Her penchant for observation and judgment, honed by her critical work, often clashes with the vulnerabilities she tries to keep hidden—vulnerabilities which the novel relentlessly exposes. Vivian’s journey is as much about uncovering the truth behind David Adler’s identity and intentions as it is about grappling with her own complicated history.

Her personal history is closely tied to her mother’s past and the blurred boundaries between performance and reality. The gradual erosion of her emotional barriers, spurred by escalating threats and revelations, leads Vivian toward a reckoning with her own identity, legacy, and trauma.

Ultimately, she emerges more self-aware, her trauma transformed into a powerful artistic voice.

David Adler

David Adler is an enigmatic figure who catalyzes the narrative’s central mystery. He initially presents himself as a student and would-be interviewer, but his intentions quickly prove more sinister and complex.

His obsession with Vivian—and, by extension, with her mother’s past—drives the plot forward and brings Vivian’s suppressed anxieties to the surface. As the story unfolds, David is revealed to be not merely an impostor but a possible half-brother.

He is shaped by feelings of abandonment, envy, and the gnawing need to uncover what he perceives as familial secrets. His methods—manipulative interviews, cryptic communications, and invasive actions—highlight both his resourcefulness and his psychological instability.

The final confrontation between David and Vivian exposes his deep-seated resentment and the destructive power of obsession. At the same time, he is humanized as someone haunted by his own unresolved past.

Irina

Irina is introduced as David’s fiancée and occupies a liminal space between victim, accomplice, and catalyst. Her frantic initial outreach to Vivian introduces the missing persons subplot and amplifies the tension surrounding David’s disappearance.

Over time, Irina’s motivations remain ambiguous—she is alternately desperate, evasive, and ultimately, self-preserving. Her eventual disappearance from the narrative, following the exposure of David’s true motives, leaves her fate uncertain.

This suggests a keen instinct for survival in the face of escalating danger and media attention. Irina’s character serves both as a red herring and as a mirror, reflecting the ways in which people orbit toxic secrets while seeking escape.

Jake Levitz

The private investigator Jake Levitz offers a counterbalance to the heightened emotions and psychological gamesmanship that dominate the story. He is professional, persistent, and somewhat jaded, helping to ground Vivian in moments of crisis.

Levitz provides the practical means through which much of the mystery is untangled. His role is not purely functional, however; Levitz’s presence also underscores themes of surveillance, trust, and the challenges of pursuing truth when identities and histories are constantly in flux.

While he remains on the periphery of the central drama, Levitz’s steady competence and concern for Vivian’s safety provide a stabilizing force as the narrative spirals toward its climax.

Themes

Identity and the Unreliable Nature of Self-Performance

Here in the Dark is deeply preoccupied with the way identity is constructed, maintained, and fractured, particularly when life itself is approached as a series of performances. Vivian’s role as a theater critic is not just a profession; it becomes a lens through which she both examines and distances herself from her own reality.

Her earlier life as Beatrice Parry is buried beneath the persona she adopts as Vivian Parry, but the boundaries between the two are constantly threatened by David’s interventions. The narrative blurs the distinction between the “true self” and the “performed self,” as Vivian’s detachment and self-curation are constantly challenged by the resurfacing of trauma, memory, and secrets from the past.

The book forces both Vivian and the reader to question to what extent anyone’s identity is authentic and how much is mere adaptation to circumstance, expectation, and survival. This is especially apparent when personal history is obscured, repressed, or violently disrupted.

Generational Trauma, Inherited Guilt, and the Haunting of Unresolved Pasts

Soloski’s novel examines the way traumas—both spoken and unspoken—are transmitted across generations. Vivian finds herself entangled not only in her mother’s choices and tragedies but also in the guilt and repercussions left unresolved.

The mysterious violence tied to her mother’s theater career, and the subsequent cover-up, reverberate throughout Vivian’s adult life, shaping her psyche and relationships. This inheritance is not just emotional but almost spectral.

Vivian is literally haunted by the past in the form of David, who becomes both an avenger and a specter of repressed history. 

The narrative suggests that the attempt to bury or ignore past violence and shame does not eradicate it, but rather distorts the present, manifesting as obsession, paranoia, and a fractured sense of belonging.

This generational entanglement complicates the idea of culpability, as Vivian must decide whether to claim, reject, or rewrite the stories handed down to her.

Illusion, Manipulation, and the Collapse of Reality Boundaries

A core theme that Soloski masterfully explores is the interplay between theatrical illusion and the search for truth. Throughout the novel, the boundaries between performance and reality erode—not just for Vivian, but for everyone touched by the central mystery.

The theatrical metaphors are not simply decorative; they become structural elements that inform how characters relate to themselves and one another. The investigative elements of the plot mimic a rehearsal or a performance, with scenes replayed, motives reinterpreted, and “roles” reassigned.

David’s elaborate deceptions, the staged confrontations, and the recurring motif of watching and being watched all serve to destabilize any firm sense of what is genuine. Soloski interrogates whether truth can ever be accessed directly or whether it is always mediated through layers of self-deception, narrative manipulation, and the demands of an audience—be it literal or psychological.

Isolation as Self-Preservation and Self-Destruction in a Surveillance Society

Vivian’s persistent isolation—her emotional withdrawal, physical solitude, and reluctance to trust—functions as both a means of self-preservation and a slow path toward self-obliteration. This solitude is repeatedly punctured by intrusions, whether in the form of mysterious emails, physical break-ins, or the invasive presence of David.

The novel positions these breaches within a larger context of surveillance, not only from other people but from the omnipresent gaze of the self. The tension between wanting to remain unseen and the impossibility of privacy is palpable, raising questions about what it means to be exposed—not just in a technological or criminal sense, but emotionally and existentially.

The irony is that Vivian’s attempts to protect herself through detachment only leave her more vulnerable to manipulation, obsession, and the very dangers she seeks to avoid.

Power, Responsibility, and the Cost of Bearing Witness

Here in the Dark probes the ethical dilemmas inherent in the act of criticism—whether in art, personal relationships, or self-examination. Vivian’s career as a critic gives her both authority and detachment, allowing her to dissect performances with clarity but also shielding her from emotional investment.

However, the narrative forces her to reckon with the limitations and dangers of this posture. The critic is not immune to the consequences of judgment, nor can she forever avoid being implicated in the events she observes.

The shifting roles—Vivian as critic, as performer, as witness, and as participant—highlight the inescapable costs of bearing witness, especially when the stakes are not only aesthetic but deeply personal.

The novel asks whether it is possible to observe without being changed, to judge without consequence, and to survive the scrutiny one turns upon oneself.