Content warning: This section of the guide discusses suicide, incest, sexual abuse of children and minors, and anti-gay violence.

Dean Holder is the narrator and protagonist of Losing Hope, who begins the story as a high school bad boy who finds his sister dead of a suicide in Chapter 2 and later falls in love with Sky Davis. His tattoo, reading “Hopeless,” gives a sense of his state of mind at the beginning of the novel. The tattoo, created by combining the names of his childhood best friend Hope, whose kidnapping he witnessed, and his sister Les, reminds him that he should not get too close to anyone because bad things happen to those he loves most. His life and personality have been shaped by losing Hope.

Dean, who has gone by Holder since he was eight, is known at school to be quick to a fight, and becomes even moodier once his sister dies. In his grief, he struggles with impulse control when he hears students gossiping about her death by suicide. Hoover explores the theme of The Relationship Between Trauma and Violence through his characterization. His tender sensitive side shows in his letters to his dead sister, and it becomes clear that his instinct and failure to protect those he loves causes most of his problems.