The Night the Stars Went Missing by Arthur Gonzalez
“The stars are made of promises. That’s what Estrella, Winston’s grandmother, used to say. And that long after her invitation to leave the earth came, the stars would remain, always there to guide and watch over him.”
These words bring Winston comfort after the loss of his grandma … until one night when the stars fail to appear in the sky! Winston’s parents assure him that this must be temporary, and that the stars should be back soon — but what if they aren’t? “If the stars are made of promises,” Winston thinks, “and promises were not meant to be broken, then why had the stars vanished?”
Determined to return the night sky to normalcy, Winston sets out on an adventure to see if he can track down the missing stars. Arthur Gonzalez’s book The Night the Stars Went Missing (Hello, Wonderworld) charts Winston’s celestial journey as he finds the reason the stars have hidden away, and manages to solve a problem much bigger than himself.
Broken Promises Made Right
Aided by Krapivina Olga’s lush, painterly illustrations, the story follows Winston as he climbs to the top of his family’s lighthouse and peers out the telescope. It seems the narrative itself of The Night the Stars Went Missing is touched by magic: the line between reality and fantasy blurs as the moon tells Winston to follow a ladder of stardust up into the skies.
Atop the puffy clouds above, he finds one singular star who explains the astral plight. “Why wouldn’t we be?” it says when Winston asks why the stars are hiding. “So many broken promises … look what’s happened to our friend, the Earth … the humans promised to take care of the Earth. How are we not to think that we are next?”
Horrified, Winston swears then and there to help rectify the plight on Earth. He promises every star that, while he might just be one boy, he has a duty to do his best and repair this broken promise on humanity’s behalf. Inspired by Winston’s integrity, the stars begin to have hope that there might be other humans like Winston — humans who care and love the planet, and who are dedicated to righting this wrong.
Healing Through Action
Neither grief nor climate anxiety are easy topics to discuss with young kids, and yet both these topics are inexorably tied to the story of The Night the Stars Went Missing. It’s Winston’s love for his late grandmother that drives him to search for the lost stars, and in the end it’s that same love that convinces the stars to take him seriously. “My grandmother told me that sometimes people do things without realizing the harm it causes,” Winston tells them, “and that we can help by teaching others what they don’t know.”
Gonzalez’s story shows readers that while sadness and anxiety can weigh on us, we do ourselves and others a disservice by letting it paralyze us. It’s through action that we’re able to harness these emotions and put them towards making our world a better place. By the end of the story, Winston feels like he is making his grandma proud by helping heal the earth and fulfilling his promise to the stars. The Night the Stars Went Missing demonstrates to young readers that even if they feel afraid and powerless, each of them have the ability to make positive change in the world.
Arthur Gonzalez is the writer of several Young Adult novels and Children’s stories. He currently resides in Los Angeles, CA, where he spends most of his time crafting stories about fantastical things, indulging in sweets (specifically chocolate) and making up his own lyrics to nearly every song (mostly because he forgets the original words).
