On April 14, 1998, Sarah de Vries disappeared from her usual spot on the corner of
Princess and Hastings in Vancouver. She became one of the many women who had vanished from
the Downtown Eastside—women, most of them sex workers and drug addicts—whose
DNA would later be found on the Pickton farm. Reflecting on her adopted sister’s
story, through Sarah’s own poetry and journals and the recollections of those close
to her at home and downtown, Maggie uncovers the portrait of a bright, charismatic woman
who found herself trapped in a downward spiral of self-loathing, prostitution, drugs, and
violence. In this achingly honest book, the reader is drawn into revelations and
understanding just as Maggie was. Tragic though it was in many ways, Sarah’s life
had meaning.