When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd Whitman's encounter with the lilacs in bloom in his mother's yard caused the flowers to become "viscerally bound to the memory of Lincoln's death". According to Gregory Eiselein: In the weeks before Lincoln's assassination, Whitman observed the planet Venus shining brightly in the evening sky. He later wrote of the observation, "Nor earth nor sky ever knew spectacles of superber beauty than some of the nights lately here. The western star, Venus, in the earlier hours of evening, has never been so large, so clear; it seems as if it told something, as if it held rapport indulgent with humanity,
Red Sky in the Morning to Katy after this. The story progresses with how Anna copes with Ben's death when he was 2 and meets Jackie who turns out to be Tony's handicapped sister. Elizabeth Laird wrote "Red Sky in the Morning" because of her little brother Alistair. Laird says in the book: "There is one exception to my usual rule. The character of Ben in this book is my brother Alistair." The other characters, Anna, Katy, Anna's school friends and her Mum and Dad, are fictional. Red Sky in the Morning Red Sky in the Morning is a young adult novel by Elizabeth Laird,